The Foodie Edition
By admin on 2015-01-19

Well to make up for what the apartment lacks I shall introduce you to some of the wonderful food, which I know is of great interest to some of you …….

So far, I have tried Sichuan, Mongolian, Taiwanese hotpot, traditional Chinese banquet, Muslim quarter, Yunnan (South China) ethnic restaurant, many and varied noodles, dumpling bar ……….(and Italian at the opening of a new restaurant) .

I cannot believe the number of restaurants and yet you still see queues for the favourites. They are around every corner and down the smallest alley or lurking in a dark corner of a ‘hutong’ and half I would probably not dare to go into without my Chinese buddies. They each seem to have their own system of ordering and thank goodness for the ones with pictures - but most just have the menu in characters not even in Pinyin (which is Chinese language written in our alphabet). Some are full of atmosphere, a favourite trick is to write a message on a post-it note, praising the restaurant or to your partner you are there with and leave it on the wall, each time you visit.

Food hygiene laws are perhaps not quite what we are used to …………… basically if you have a wok on the back of a tricycle or a space more than the width of a counter you can open a cafe. Washroom facilities……….??? At the Hot-pot place you choose a selection of raw foods and cook it piece by piece, in a pan of boiling soup set in the counter in front of you, which the waitress keeps topping up. When we were there the young girl handling all the boiling water skidded on the wet floor and went down with such a crack - no one came to help her, no one around the counter moved, she just pulled a face, got up, dusted off and limped on serving the boiling soup. I felt bad, but they are very hard working and stoic.

Usually you order and your meal arrives quickly and in no apparent order; eating strawberries in the middle of meat and noodles and vegetable is totally acceptable. Food is a serious business here and apart from the huge banquets, which are usually business lunches with lots of toasts and pomp and ceremony, meals are conducted to eat not socialise. Last night we were basically asked to leave the table the minute we finished eating because they just want to get the next lot seated. That’s why I have always found Chinese restaurants in the UK lacking in style - usually it’s just basically tables and bright lights, but for them ambience is not the essential, it’s the food. And boy do they love their food! It is the first topic of conversation. A colloquialism is that they don’t say ‘good morning’ they say’ have you eaten breakfast’ - the first time I was asked this I started telling the person all about my cereal, now I realise he didn’t really want to know!

I was privileged to be invited to someone’s home for lunch as I had been told it is not usual to ask people to your house, this is partly because both cooking and dining facilities may be limited (NB my apartment!) and also because preparing a spread of Chinese food for visitors is quite an undertaking with so many different dishes. But they were delighted to have a foreign guest and as one of my hosts was about to open her own restaurant she was happy to do the cooking. I am hoping I might get some ‘lessons’ while I am here.

To make you smile, I was met at the subway and taken to the apartment on the back of his bicycle - picture that!

Enjoy the photos, hope they make your mouth water.