YES!!!

Finally, I did the impossible. I cooked a multi-step boil/fry/braise Chinese sweet and sour spareribs dish, and it came out very, very, VERY good. The presentation was beautiful; glossy and the sauce was the right sticky consistency. I stir-fried some gai lan with Sichuan peppercorns, chili peppers and salt as an accompaniment and then steamed some brown, unhulled, short-grained rice.

For the longest time, I felt like I had a mental block with medium-difficult Chinese cooking. Ever since that fateful night where I invited this guy over for a simple cold slivered chicken noodle dish with sesame sauce, and the noodles turned out chewy, sticking together and the sauce was a muddled mess. I placed too much focus on entertaining my guest instead of paying attention to what I was doing in the kitchen. It shook me that I could do so horribly for someone else. It was almost inedible. i felt very much like a stage actor who forgets one of the most important lines of the play in front of a sold out audience. Yeah, it was that embarrassing.

Tonight, I turned the tide for myself. With that one dish, I gained a multitude of confidence back. Now I'm ready to serve others again, and know that I can do it well.