Sunday, January 02, 2005

Chef Chan's

We finally rolled up at Chef Chan's at Odeon Tower after a cold grey drizzly day. It looked like a designer chinese temple: black walls, subdued lighting, chinese lanterns, carved enamel wood-panelling, antiques on ancient altar tables, Qin calligraphy...erm...and a flashing Christmas tree...

Formerly from Hai Tien Lo, Chef Chan is apparently known for 3 dishes (ok, so it doesn't translate well from chinese): roast chicken, sauteed black pepper beef and shark's fin soup. I was skeptical about the roast chicken. Ever since I'd come off strict vegetarianism (along with staunch Buddhism), my stomach has been very sensitive to meat and in particular, shuts down without delay once it catches a whiff of foul defrosted fowl. The nakedness of a roast chicken means that it doesn't have even a sauce to hide behind if it is blemished in any way. But this particular one was a beauty. The crisp red-brown skin and the tender tasty white flesh came as a surprise. (My stomach was already preparing to take its leave.) Ate about half the dish.

Why did God give animals for food only after the Flood?
In the beginning,
God said to man:"I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food."(Genesis 1:29). And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground-everything that has the breath of life in it, God gave "every green plant for food."(Genesis 1:30).

So they were all herbivores then.

Then, after the Fall and after the Tower of Babel and after the Flood, God said to Noah and family (the only humans left),"Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything." (Genesis 9:3).

And they became omnivores.

Curious.

Are we to rule over the animals by eating them? Then the Chinese must surely be the best at fulfilling that creational role!