Ah breakfast…the most important meal of the day, or so I’m told. Now growing up, I didn’t eat much breakfast during my high school year, or even my college years; I just never woke up in time for breakfast. My theory was that those extra thirty minutes of sleep were way more important. Since then, I’ve gotten much better at waking up at breakfast time, but I still don’t eat much. Usually just a granola bar or yogurt. However, on the weekends, where I could sleep in, my mom would always make breakfast a little later, and so one of my favorite breakfast dishes was congee. This is really just rice porridge, aka soupy rice and we would eat this with a lot of side dishes.



This is super easy, and really flexible. I believe each Asian culture does this a little differently, as I’ve had Vietnamese and Korean versions, both quite different. My version here is just left over rice, covered with water and then heated up. Stir it once in a while so the bottom doesn’t burn or dry out. Then you just eat it with a few sides. I picked out the ones I could remember from my childhood.

This one is a hit or miss with the black egg there. You may know it as the thousand-year egg or century egg. It’s simply a preserved egg, in this case, a duck egg. It is plated with some silken tofu topped with soy paste and dried, shredded, pork. Yum in my book.

Left plate: Chili radishes, bamboo shoots, fried glutton.

Middle small plate: roasted eel

Right plate: scrambled eggs with some soy paste drizzled on top.

I should mention the left plate has all jarred items, and the eel is from a can. I don’t think I would have the time to prepare all these side items from scratch and they are quite delicious none the less(though probably not the most healthiest). But this was how it was prepared for me as a kid, and some things are just hard to stray away from.