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This is How You Celebrate Lunar New Year
With Chinese dumplings and Korean rice cakes
You wake up and remember it’s not just another Saturday. Sometime between zombie-rising from your bed and brushing your teeth, you remember New Year’s is here again. Three weeks ago it was January 1st. Today is not quite Lunar New Year, but the weekend before.
Your wife is Chinese and your brother’s Korean. This means you’re going to spend the day making Chinese dumplings and Korean rice cakes, song-pyeon (송편).
Once your brother arrives, there is no dumpling-making. There is Budweiser and store-bought rice cakes (인절미) as you settle to watch “Single’s Inferno.”
Like the busy millennials you are, your wife and you rush to buy what you need right after walking your dog. You’ve been saying since last week you need to stock up on groceries before the weekend, but here you are, Saturday morning, pulling into a parking spot at the closest H-Mart.
The Korean supermarket chain is surprisingly empty, the wares freshly stocked and neat. You should come here more often at this time, you think as you pick up strawberries and Chinese vinegar, rice powder and ground pork. Before the hour, you’re back at home. On the…
