Last summer, I had taken a picture of this stew that my mom made with Shepherd's Purse or ji tsai - a native vegetable of Shanghai, where she grew up. It's a recipe I always fall back on, partly because it's cheap and easy to make, and partly because it's my form of comfort food - stuff that I grew up on. The funny thing is that this picture got accepted on Foodgawker, while my very first photo of it did not. I suppose one thing I did change was something I read off another blog a while back. When you have a stew-like object that consists of a medly of protrusions that make the surface of the dish convoluted, it's better to try to use light to reflect off of it. Usually, you want to avoid reflections, but if you notice, this time I really tried to incorporate that in the photo. It's not a pretty dish, I have to admit (what with the tofu all chunky), so if I had simply rid myself of the reflecting light, I would definitely not been able to portray the pure delicious-ness of it as well. Unfortunately, you can only find the frozen variety of Shepherd's Purse here in the U.S. but for things like stew or stirfry, that doesn't downgrade the taste too much. Last year, when I visited Shanghai before medical school, I got to see and taste fresh ji tsai for the first time...it was amazing! Usually, Shanghai people use this vegetable for humbler dishes like this tofu stew or stirfried with rice cakes - but even then, you can taste a distinct difference just by adding the locally grown variety into your diet.
<-- Here is what it is supposed to look like. I actually thought it was a weed when I first saw it. At some point, I'll put up a picture of the frozen package label, too. 
