The past few times I had to cook dinner for the eve of CNY I usually just called up my mom to get ideas and cook dishes that were relatively easy to make. I even remember a conversation we had when I couldn't figure out if the prawns were fresh or not as she's usually my go-to person for anything cooking or kitchen related. Longevity noodles is one of my favourites to make on CNY.

This year the challenge is doing everything without meat. And I have a guest joining us for dinner and he's got rather discerning taste buds so there's some pressure.

I've got to figure out new dishes .... stuff I don't cook everyday so my god-brother won't complain that he's eating the same thing again for CNY. Which means I've got to go through recipe books and figure out a combination of stuff that will work well together and that isn't too adventurous.

Argh ... I can't decide if I should stick with mostly Asian dishes or do something unusual and try Western dishes since they're more interesting to make and that'll really be different from the usual stuff I make at home.

But what is Chinese New Year dinner without a Chinese or Asian touch right?

What's more ... I'm gonna go out on a limb by not trying out the recipes before the actual day. Given time constraints and a penchant for liking to wing it, I'll take this as a test of how well I can follow a recipe and how well I can improvise if I think the dish isn't going as expected.

Stay tuned for the final decision on the menu, pictures of the process + final outcome and check out Bryan's LJ or Facebook to see if his stomach survived this.