It was a snowy day during the spring break when I walked into a great restaurant. In this blizzard weather, it was the only restaurant that remained open.

The restaurant has a long history in Hong Kong. Its owners, the couple, Peter and Michelle, have been running the restaurant since 2007.

“Things have changed a lot in the past 30 years,” Peter said. “Chinese students 20 years ago thought that a 70-cent bowl of rice was too expensive, but now a $20 meal is acceptable”. He also said that the new generation of Chinese students engaged with other students, bringing all their non-Chinese friends to visit the restaurant.

Peter takes great pride in his own cooking. He was curious about how the food was made and why particular foods or sauces had specific tastes. He chose to serve mainly Guangdong and Sichuan food at the restaurant, featuring the family-style Chinese dim sum or hot pot.

When I asked whether he would modify the taste of the dishes to suit the taste of most Americans, Peter said, “We are not like those American Chinese restaurants. We provide the genuine Chinese taste to our customers, and they will love it because it is delicious, and their taste will suit the taste of our dishes, not the other way around.”

“If I hear complaints from my customers, I will be so upset that I can’t fall asleep at night”, he said. “Luckily most of my favorite dishes received wide acclaim from my customers and it takes more than one person’s effort.”

He compares himself with the craftsmen in China who are proud of preserving ancient Chinese art and whose motivation is only on people’s enjoyment of their work and thought.

Such a spirit of craftsmanship has been remarkable and greatly valued in the past. The craftsman’s spirit with perfection, precision, concentration, and patience remains in Peter and his cooking.

There’s been lots of concern recently about the potential dangers of microwave popcorn (爆米花), but is this concern founded, or just overmuch fear-spreading? The answer is that many of the chemicals that caused worry in earlier decades have been removed from microwave popcorn, but some critics still are not satisfied.

“You may consider popcorn to be a low-calorie, high-fiber snack, but microwave popcorn isn’t a healthy choice,” explains nutrition expert Dan DeFigio. That’s because microwave popcorn bags were coated with perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) to prevent oil substance from leaking out. One particular type of PFC, known as perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), has been linked to certain cancers, but the American Cancer Society says the evidence is unsure and more research is being done about this.

Nevertheless, in response to concerns about PFCs, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) worked with popcorn makers back in 2011 to remove PFOA from their packaging. Three more PFCs were banned in the next five years. So today’s microwave popcorn doesn’t have these chemicals, but critics say that the alternatives could cause problems as the old ones, but less is known about them.

That’s not the only problem, however. The chemical that for decades lent buttery deliciousness to popcorn has also been connected in rare cases with major lung damage. Known as diacetyl (二乙酰), it’s long been a documented problem with workers in popcorn making facilities, but also can be risky for people who just eat the snack a lot. A 2007 study published in the journal Critical Reviews found that more than 80 percent of chemical release happened when the bag was opened post-popping. Although diacetyl has been removed from most products, some critics claim that the alternative to diacetyl is also harmful.

Most of the exposure to diacetyl came from inbreathing rather than eating popcorn. Therefore, experts recommend at least waiting for the bag to cool before you open it to reduce potentially harmful chemical exposure. Better yet, make your own fresh at home with an air popper. If you like to flavor it, add organic butter or some cheese.

Few people can resist the lure (诱惑) of a delicious ice cream, especially on a hot day. The only thing that spoils the fun is that the treat is hard to enjoy slowly, often ending up with a sticky melted mess. Now, researchers from Colombia's Pontificia Bolivariana University may have found an unlikely partner to help solve this age-old problem---cellulose fiber(纤维素) extracted from banana plant waste. Bananas, as you probably know, grow in bunches on a tree-like plant. Each bunch is attached to a central stalk, called a rachis(叶轴), which is thrown once the fruit has been harvested. The team, led by Dr. Robin Zuluaga Gallego, began extracting cellulose nanofibrils (CNFS) from powdered rachis. The tasteless, odorless macro fibers, thousands of times smaller than the width of a human hair were then added in various concentrations to 100 grams of ice cream mix.

With the right amount of CNFS mixed in, the dessert lasted longer in its frozen state than conventional ice cream, extending both its shelf life and the amount of time the treat can be enjoyed. Even more exciting was that the fibers increased the stickiness of low-fat ice cream to levels higher than the full-fat one. Since this is what determines the frozen treats’ creaminess and texture, CNFS could help create healthier ice cream without compromising on taste.

The researchers, who presented their findings at the American Chemical Society (ACS) meeting in New Orleans on March 21, 2018, next plan to investigate how different types of fat, such as coconut oil, affect the behavior of CNFS in other frozen treats.

The Colombian researchers are not the only one working on creating a slower-melting ice cream. In 2015, scientists at the University of Dundee in Scotland found that a naturally occurring protein called BSIA(Bacterial Surface Layer A) was remarkably effective in keeping the treat frozen for longer periods of time. With both teams competing to be the first to get to market, the future of everyone’s favorite dessert certainly looks promising.