][1]As we mentioned earlier this week, the Chinese New Year starts tomorrow and the 5pm Dining blog wishes you all Kung Hei Fat Choy, or Happy New Year.
Naturally, we think you should celebrate by booking in for some top Chinese food in your favourite restaurant. Obviously, many will be shut over the next few days which may make booking immediately rather tricky. One option, as we mentioned previously, would be to swing over to the Chinese New Year dinner at the Brasserie on George Square.
Chinese New Year at home
Alternatively, you could follow these tips from the good people at Tsingtao Beer and recreate your own Chinese New Year at home.
First of all, clean your home. Yeah, yeah, we know that you do that every day anyway but, according to Chinese tradition, cleaning the house will ‘sweep away bad luck’ which may have accumulated inside over the past year. The clean house is then ready for good luck to start entering again.
Next, you need to do some decorating. Red lanterns, streamers and balloons are ideal as red is a celebratory colour for the Chinese and symbolises good luck. Try to arrange decorations in quantities of eight, considered a very lucky number in Chinese folklore.
Light the bangers
Follow this by lighting up some firecrackers – in a safe and responsible manner, obvs. They are said to scare bad spirits away.
Finally, look out the wok and rustle up some authentic Chinese dishes. Tsingtao have provided some recipes here. I’m going for the stir-fried chicken cashew nut.
New Chinese restaurant in Edinburgh
While on the subject of Chinese food, our STV chums have unearthed a new place on Edinburgh’s Marshall Street.
The idea behind Lian Pu is to showcase less familiar dishes from the more remote regions of China. Sounds very intriguing.
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