“T” is for Take-out #AtoZChallenge @AprilA2Z

There comes a time in a man’s life when a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.  And one of those times is after a long day’s work, you’re exhausted.  There’s so much traffic coming home, the kids are eye high in homework… you’re beat.  Everyone’s beat.    You don’t want to spend hours prepping dinner, nor face the interminable cleanup after dinner. There aren’t enough hours in the day, and it’s too much of a hassle to get everyone out the door to go out to eat… There’s only ONE solution… Take-out Chinese food!

And no matter what time you call, no matter how crowded the Chinese restaurant might be, you ALWAYS here the happiest two words in the English language:  Ten minutes!

Phenomenal!?  How do they do it?  Ever see the size of a Chinese take-out menu?  Of course you have… pardon that silly question!  HOW in the world can the chef be ready to prepare over 100 different dishes and have it all done, packed in the take-out box, stacked in to a brown paper bag with the menu stapled to it so you’ll have a new one the next time you need it, with square corrugated paper to keep the dishes from falling, inside a plastic bag along with a fortune cookie for every dish along with soy sauce, duck sauce, hot mustard, and plastic utensils and have it ALL waiting for you when you walk in the door to pick up your order?  Even if you’re there in LESS than 10 minutes??!!

Remember that dreaded word I mentioned earlier, “cleanup”?  Imagine if you don’t even have dishes to wash.  Of course you could eat directly out of the containers, BUT, did you know this little secret:

Some interesting tidbits about Chinese Take-out:

Invented in America:

The Chinese takeout container was patented in Chicago, on Nov. 13, 1894, by Frederick Weeks Wilcox.  He created a “paper pail” from a single piece of paper that was creased into segments and then folded into what was, hopefully, a leak-proof container with a wire handle on top.  The support folds were on the outside — creating a flat inside surface which made it pretty easy to slide food smoothly onto a plate.

100 million Chinese food carton boxes are used every year in New York City.

Lobster sauce doesn’t deserve its bad rap:

It tastes so rich it has to be naughty, right?  Actually, at just about 50 calories per quarter-cup, it’s one of the lower-cal sauces. “It’s not laden with sugar like sweet and sour sauce, either,” notes Katie Chin, a chef and author of 300 Best Rice Cooker Recipes.

On the other hand, those light-as-air shrimp chips aren’t so light:

They seem way healthier than old-school crunchy noodles.  But don’t be fooled: They’re a mix of deep-fried shrimp and starch, and they’ll set you back more than 200 calories and 14 grams of fat per handful, says Jessica Ganzer, RD.

On our Quest, we’re looking for the best AUTHENTIC Chinese food, and so should you.  Here’s why:

Chinese food, when authentic, is probably the healthiest food in the world.  Some restaurants, which are not authentic, prepare their menu with highly saturated fats or with meats that contain unhealthy amounts of animal fat.  These Chinese restaurants are not recommended and they are both neither authentic nor healthy.

Good Chinese food however, is prepared and cooked with poly unsaturated oils.  Authentic Chinese food does not require the use of milk-fat ingredients such as cream, butter or cheese.  Meat is used, but not in abundance, which makes it easy for those who love authentic Chinese food to avoid high levels of animal fat.  Many believe that authentic Chinese food is really the ideal diet.

Humbly submitted for your consumption,

—Mee Magnum  (“Chop!  Chop!”)