I grew up eating egg sandwiches in the mean streets of Chinatown, Vancouver. Just kidding, the streets weren't mean at all. This was before "Asian gangs". It wasn't until the up-to-no-gooders of my generation grew up with an inferiority complex of their immigrant background that those appeared.

Instead, this was a time when Chinatown was really a town -- a community of immigrants creating a piece of home together and sharing the struggle in a foreign country full of promise for the next generation.

A big portion of the immigrants were from Toishan, a small city in the Guangdong province which has its own dialect -- a dialect that, to this day, I find both endearing and largely incomprehensible. It's a common trope in Hong Kong movies to portray simple, quaint characters speaking the Toishan dialect, the equivalent of characters with a southern accent in American movies.

My family was always busy and always working, so they tag teamed taking care of me. I spent a lot of time with everyone in my family, which is why I feel close to all of them.

When I entered kindergarten, the teacher asked us to draw a picture of our family. Upon looking at my picture, the teacher remarked, "Wow, you have a big family." All the other kids drew a picture of their mom, dad, siblings and dog. I drew a picture of my parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins on both sides, because to me, that was family -- no "extended" required. And there was no dog because Chinese people...uh...never mind. (Too far? I apologize.)

During the child care hand-offs, when there was no time to sit for a proper meal, my grandmother (who got the hand-off most of the time) would buy me an egg sandwich, neatly tucked into a small white paper bag or wrapped in parchment, from one of the many Hong Kong style diners or cafés.

I always had the predicament of trying to eat it quickly so the condensation wouldn't make the sandwich soggy, yet not so quickly that I would burn myself. These sandwiches were hot (even to hold, for the sensitive hands of a child) and got hotter the deeper you got into the sandwich.

Nowadays, Vancouver is full of wealthy immigrants from Hong Kong, Taiwan and most recently China. Chinatown has become a gentrified historical area with expensive highrises, trendy Chinese themed restaurants and hipsters. But you can still find a Chinese egg sandwich at every Chinese diner and Hong Kong style café. Its place in modern Chinese culture is akin to that of the grilled cheese sandwich in American culture -- it's a simple, homey comfort food, which everyone needs once in a while.

Ingredients

• 2 eggs
• 4 slices of white bread -- I'm usually not a fan of white bread, but for some things, it's a must.
• 2 slices of cheese -- The original doesn't have cheese -- Chinese people don't eat cheese, which is why so many of us are lactose intolerant -- but I'm Canadian too, eh!
• salt
• cooking oil

Method

• Beat 2 eggs with a pinch of salt. Here's a trick my grandfather taught me, who ran a Hong Kong style café with my grandmother for 20 years: if you add a teaspoon of oil to the eggs when you beat them, they get really light and fluffy. Here's a trick I taught myself: it's easier to beat and pour eggs from a mug than from a bowl.

• Prepare 2 slices of bread with cheese on them.

• Add some cooking oil to a pan and turn to medium heat. When the pan is hot, pour in half the egg and distribute it evenly over the pan fairly thinly. Do this quickly because the egg will cook almost instantaneously.

• Fold the egg in half, then in half again. The layered egg is what defines this kind of egg sandwich.

• Place the folded egg on the cheese of one of the "half sandwiches".

• Repeat with the other half of the beaten eggs.
• Place a slice of bread on top of each half sandwich to complete them.
• Place both sandwiches in the pan to toast the bread. Lightly pressing down on them with a flipper helps.
• Move the sandwiches around the pan to soak up any oil and extra egg bits left. No waste! It also serves to get the pan cleaning started. Efficiency!

• Flip the sandwiches over and toast the other side.

I'm not normally into photographing half-eaten food, but I wanted to give you a better look at the layered eggs. I'm more into eating the other half of half eaten food (I mean my own), which I will do now. Om nom!