I have been doing some serious ‘lowing’ over this Chinese New Year.  I love that the word for tossing the lo hei* is – in all seriousness – actually called that.  Lowing. It makes me think of being in vague proximity to a manger.

I recently read that there was a guy here in Singapore who once ate lo hei fifty times over one Chinese New Year (there are, what, 15 days in the official CNY period? Plus another seven if you count the week leading up to it all…so that’s just 22 days). I have managed eight this year which I thought (until I read otherwise) was quite good.

I love the messiness of it all. Toss things as high as you can with your extra long chopsticks – the red stripy ones at Min Jiang were pretty snazzy; pic above – and your luck and good fortune is all the greater.

Never before has incompetent and messy chopstick use been so celebrated – my English and more or less non-chopstick-using parents are much relived.

Out of all the places I’ve tried, my favourite lo hei has been at Yan Ting at the St Regis. It probably costs more than it does at most other places, but I would argue that it’s twice as good.

Min Jiang’s version at The Goodwood was sadly only average (too much of that dyed green and overly sweetened melon rind which I am not wild about) and I hated the rolled up latex glove left waiting on the table to hygenically aportion the salmon/squeeze the lime/add the crispy gold coins/whatever.

It looks, at a glance, like the sort of thing that should definitely not be anywhere near food, let alone left on a table with a spoon next to it:

The fall-out after the lowing has taken place is always a marker for the group enthusiasm for the dish. This is our effort after a lunch for ten at the Super Peking Duck restaurant in Paragon:

…not too bad.

We have only until Sunday to keep eating this dish…I wonder how many more I can squeeze in?

*If you are not sure what I am going on about and what the hell lo hei actually is, read my post I wrote about it last year.