It is almost noon on this 8th day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. I am happy and pleased that I am still here tapping out another post. I did not have time for a morning walk but perhaps later this afternoon. I can walk to the Asian Market for some dried Shiitake mushrooms and then stop in to check on my father. The mushrooms are one of the must ingredients in making sticky rice. I’ve developed a yen for making it with lotus and bamboo leaves.

I’ve gathered all my ingredients – lotus and bamboo leaves, split mung beans, peanuts, Chinese sausage, dried shrimps, glutinous rice. I’m running low on the mushrooms. It is a labour intensive endeavour. It sounds so much fun in theory. I got rather cranky after making the lotus leaf sticky rice. The dry leaves are huge. You have to soak them for at least 2 hours before they are pliable to work with. Then you have to clean them because you don’t know what kind of pond they came from and what kind of things are attached to them. Here’s my photo gallery of the process.

For the hours of struggle, it added to only 6 lotus leaf sticky rice. Enough time has passed since I made them. In my mind it is fun again. It will be easier the second time around. My leaves are prepped. They just have to be thawed.