Hua Jiao is a Chinese spice also known as "flower pepper" Photo: Nocas

Rufus is in the kitchen cooking up some pot stickers. My chop sticks are at the ready, because it smells great.

He's not in there dicing veggies and folding wonton wrappers, because tonight's dinner is courtesy of the freezer section. We don't know if they contain the special ingredient.

Hua Jiao!

We have a lifetime supply of the stuff in the pantry, if indeed that is what I bought. It's the spice my friend told me about when I asked her for her authentic homemade recipe for these delicious little dumplings.

Her Instructions: Add "hua jiao" to the mixture (ask your local Chinese market for this — it's a spice that, incidentally, is in the same family as pot (!!), but without the wacky side effects, and is completely legal.)

Hua Jiao!

I wrote the words on a piece of paper and showed them to the nice man at the International Market who agreed to help me. He did not speak English well, and I didn't speak his language at all, but I was pretty sure we were communicating. He led me to aisle three and pulled a rice-sized bag of what looked like cracked cloves off the shelf.

"This it?" he asked.

The Chinese characters on the bag gave me no hints.

"I don't know," I admitted, so he asked what I was making. His expression when I told him revealed that he wasn't so sure I had the right product. So I mentioned the only other thing I knew about hua jiao in hopes of confirming its authenticity.

"Is this a member of the pot family?" I whispered.

I smile of recognition spread across his face.

"Ahhh, pot," he said with a nod. "Yes!" Now we're speaking the same language, I thought. Then he motioned for me to follow him.

We trekked through the store on a mission, all the while I worried about what he thought I was trying to buy. Then he stopped in front of the aisle with the cooking vessels, and confirmed that he was right.

"Pots. Yes?" he asked.

"Yes, thank you," I said.

The homemade pot stickers I made from my friend's recipe were absolutely out of this world. It was a fun night of cooking and construction, and more special than the kind of project you might take on for a random Wednesday night. But we still have plenty of Hua Jiao, and get a chuckle out of this story. No wacky side effects at all - unless you count laughter.