|
Post by Raoul Duke on Jul 23, 2004 2:07:05 GMT 7
One of the hardest things for me to do as an Expat is to dine alone in a restaurant. English menus can be rare, often include about 10% of the total choices, and sometimes have higher prices than the Chinese menus. Often, you find yourself eating the same few dishes over and over until you're ready to shoot the next waitress who brings you a plate of them.
No, if you want to eat decently in a restaurant, you need to know some dishes. In this section is a collection of Chinese dishes that are Barfly Approved...or at least that we consumed and lived to tell about.
I'm starting the ball rolling with some classic, standard dishes that a) I personally like a lot and b) are easy to find all over China. I'll add more as time goes by...
You're invited to add to this list, too. ONE RULE: If you don't know for sure how to write it in pinyin, complete with tones, please find out before posting it. You can probably find a real Chinese person around somewhere. The idea here is to make this list useful...(I know, a Saloon first)...and if you can't say it so people will understand you, it ain't useful. (Speaking of useful, you'll need to know how to read pinyin for this list to be useful. 'Fraid you're on your own there...)
Also, please give a brief description of the dish. If you know it's a regional dish, please give the region it's from so people don't go trying to find Xinjiang dishes in a Dongbei restaurant.
NOTE: Just as in our own countries, most recipes are not carved in stone. There are endless variations on dishes in every town, every house, and every restaurant. Ingredients, spicing, sauces, etc. can vary wildly from place to place. For example, Gong Bao Ji Ding served in its native Sichuan can set your whole head on fire, while by the time it gets to Shanghai it's not especially hot. Usually. Making matters worse, different dishes (and even basic ingredients) have different names in different parts of China. TIFC (This Is F*cking China). We all do our best.
SOME DINING BASICS Chopsticks Kuai4 Zi Fork (You weenie!) Cha1 Zi Knife Dao1 Zi Spoon Tang1 Shao2 Plate Die2 Bowl Wan3 Paper napkin Can1 Jin1 Zhi3 Salt Yan2 Black Pepper Hu2 Jiao1 Soy Sauce Jiang4 You2 Rice Mi2 Fan4 Fried Rice Dan4 Chao3 Fan4 Cup or Glass Bei1 Zi Green Tea Qing1 Cha2 Black Tea Hong2 Cha2 Beer Pi2 Jiu3 Cola Ke2 Le4 Bottled water Ping2 Shui3 Iced/Cold Bing1 De
Bon appetit!
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Jul 23, 2004 2:56:06 GMT 7
OK, let's eat! (WARNING: I really like hot peppers!)
Gong1 Bao3 Ji1 Ding1 Known abroad as "Kung Pao Chicken". Possibly the most common dish ordered by foreigners in China. A Sichuan classic that has spread widely across China- availaible almost everywhere. Boneless chicken breast, diced and stir-fried with peanuts, onions, and hot peppers in a rich brown sauce.
Ma2 La4 Dou1 Fu, aka Ma2 Po3 Dou1 Fu Another Sichuan original that's taken root across China and is found everywhere. Cubes of tofu cooked with diced pork and hot peppers in a light sauce.
Yu2 Xiang1 Rou4 Si1 It means "Fish-Fragrance Shredded Pork", but there's no fish- or fish fragrance- anywhere in it. Go figure. Shredded boneless pork stir-fried with hot peppers and ginger in a tangy, peppery sauce. Don't let the fish thing throw you...seriously good stuff.
Jiao1 Yan2 Pai2 Tiao2 Another Sichuan dish widely found elsewhere. Strips of pork are breaded and deep-fried. They're placed in a dish and topped with lightly-cooked peppers, onions, ginger, and spices. Beware the small bone frequently found under the breading at one end of the pork strip- apparently there just to see if you're paying attention.
Tang2 Cu4 Zhu1 Rou4 aka Tang2 Cu4 Pai2 Gu3 aka Tang2 Cu4 Li4 Zhi3 aka Gou3 Bao3 Rou4 The most common Chinese dish outside of China- Sweet and Sour Pork. Probably Cantonese in origin but now universal. A thousand variations here, but usually cubes or slices of pork battered and fried, and served in a sauce made with sugar, vinegar, and a dash of tomato ketchup for color. Often served with chunks of pineapple and green pepper. Usually boneless, but not always.
Hui2 Guo1 Rou4 It means "return-to-the-pot meat", and is rendered in English as "Twice-Cooked Pork". I think this is a Hunanese dish that again is found everywhere. Thin strips of rather fatty pork are cooked briefly, removed from heat, and then stir-fried with hot peppers, cabbage, onion, and ginger. Sauce, if any, is very light.
Kao3 Yang2 Rou4 Literally means "roast mutton", but refers to those heavenly lamb sticks. Originates from Xinjiang, but now seen all over China. Available in Xinjiang restaurants but a favorite street food, it's found in every town in China being roasted on a grill right on the sidewalk by guys in funny hats, often with a boom box blaring Boogie-Uygur music while you eat. Cubes of mutton and mutton fat are alternated on a skewer, then roasted over hot coals while being heaped with exotic Central Asian spices. If you say "la4" they can make it hot for you. Wonderful hot off the grill with triangles of fresh Xinjiang bread.
|
|
proust
Upstanding Citizen
Posts: 84
|
Post by proust on Jul 23, 2004 11:55:21 GMT 7
Yummy! Let me add a cold-weather favorite in Shanghai: Xiang1 Gu1 Mian4 Jing1 Mian4. Noodles in broth with black mushrooms. Cheap and filling. Best with a couple of dashes of vinegar [cu4] and a spoon or two of chili sauce [la4 jiang4].
|
|
|
Post by Nate M on Jul 27, 2004 8:16:28 GMT 7
|
|
|
Post by ilunga on Jul 27, 2004 12:52:33 GMT 7
How popular is the mongolian style hotpot (hou gua) where you guys are? I love the outdoor places in summer where you can get the fresh beer, kao yan rou and, my absolute favourite thing, cao niu yu (grilled catfish). (Kao3 Nian2 Yu2? -Ed.)Hotpot's great for warming you up in winter as well. Just stay clear of the sheep eyeballs How can food this good be so cheap?
|
|
gmat
Up And Coming
Posts: 23
|
Post by gmat on Jul 27, 2004 15:11:42 GMT 7
Great info Nate and Raoul. Much appreciated!!!
ilunga, the hot pot restaurants are everywhere in Dalian and quite popular.
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Jul 27, 2004 23:07:12 GMT 7
Glad it's useful, Gmat. Really hoping this stuff will be. And kudos, Nate, on a great find. Thanks.
OK, let's talk about Hot Pot (Huo3 Guo1)...it isn't seen much in the West (at least not in America) because the insurance companies would just poo.
There is a "Mongolian" tradition of hot pot, but the one widely seen in China comes from the fiery kitchens of Sichuan. It's wildly popular in every part of China I've seen so far. It was big (nay, ubiquitous) in the far-northeastern city of Changchun, which is bitten hard by the winters, but it also packs them in in Shanghai in the summertime, when it's hot enough outside to boil a monkey's bum. I can't hang with this one in the summer.
In most Huo Guo restaurants, you'll be seated at a table with a hole cut in the middle of it. Beneath the hole is a gas burner connected to a small tank of LP gas. Your waiter will light the burner and fit a large metal pot filled with soup into the hole. A popular choice is Yin-Yang Hot Pot (yuan1 yang2 huo3 guo1), in which the pot is divided into 2 halves, in the classic yin-yang shape, by a metal divider. The red side is an extremely spicy-hot soup; the white side is a mild neutral broth with- I am not making this up- a whole fish in it. It's just there to flavor the soup. As the soup boils, the staff will come by occasionally and add more broth to the pot or to adjust your fire.
The ordering part mostly consists of selecting which platefuls of paper-thin-sliced meats, vegetables, noodles, etc. you're going to eat. You may also have a number of dipping sauces to choose from...my favorite is the peanut sauce or the red tofu sauce. All these dishes are brought to the table completely raw.
After a few minutes the soup will start to boil. Some of the meat and vegetables is added to the soup. Many will be ready to eat when the water returns to a boil, but some things such as potatoes will need to boil for a minute. Fish the bits out with your chopsticks, dip them in your sauce, and eat. Really great stuff....especially on a cold day. You'll be glad you brought some antacids with you...the red soup is really hot! The Changchun restaurants will bring by tiny scoops of ice cream from time to time to help you put out the fire in your mouth...
|
|
|
Post by loftus on Jul 28, 2004 6:01:19 GMT 7
What about MaPo Tofu?? How do you say that in Chinglish??
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Jul 28, 2004 6:18:32 GMT 7
Happens to be in the dish list above...
|
|
|
Post by George61 on Jul 28, 2004 6:31:56 GMT 7
I can't write tones into my Pinyin...sorry. Just haven't got a clue which is which. I notice, though that Raouls translations are different to what are in Shandong...Iced e.g. is, up here Bing la....not as down there Bing Da. having said that, I am told I speak Chinese with a Tai'an accent...verrrry strange!! Dishes vary all over the country and from one restaurant to another...Tang Su Li Ji...sweet and sour pork, varies wildly from place to place. ....and I've never had HotPot with potatoes!!
|
|
|
Post by ilunga on Jul 28, 2004 12:56:25 GMT 7
That all sounds familiar Raoul. Apologies for my awful pinyin. I think Mongolian and Sichuan hotpot must be pretty similar. Although I guess the Sichuan variety will be a lot spicier. The standard hotpot in Luoyang is practically the same as the one I had in Hohhot. It has a spicy and non-spicy section, and you've got the sesame sauce and another one I'm not too keen on. There's separate restaurants for the fish hotpot. My favourite is a three-way hotpot place which is split into chicken, tomato and spicy flavour soups. I love the tomato flavour. Sometimes I don't bother with the food and just drink the broth.
|
|
Steve
Upstanding Citizen
Posts: 63
|
Post by Steve on Aug 11, 2004 22:12:39 GMT 7
Great eating! Let me add a few of my favorites to the list:
Yu[2] Xiang[1] Qie[2] Zi This is a spicy eggplant dish in fish flavored sauce. They chop the eggplants into small pieces, and the flavors mix very nicely. For some reason it goes great with rice!
Lan[2] Zhou[1] La[4] Mian[4] This is a tasty beef noodle dish from Lanzhou and practically every city, town, and village has a small restaurant named after it. Look for this sign: À¼ÖÝÀÃæ Add hot peppers to the noodles for more zip. It is also entertaining to watch them slap the dough on the table as they make the noodles.
Ding[1] Ding[1] Chao[3] Mian[4] A Xinjiang dish that resembles Macaroni and Cheese. Far better than Kraft Dinner, these small chopped noodles come with a sweet sauce and green peppers. La[4] Zi Ji[1] Ding[1] Small pieces of chicken buried in a densely packed array of hot peppers. There are so frickin many that you literally have to fish for the chicken among the peppers.
Ji[1] Ding[1] Mian[4] Same as the 'kung pao' chicken in Raoul's post, except this is made in a noodle dish.
Nan[2] Xiang[2] Xiao[3] Long[1] The famous dome-shaped street dumplings from Shanghai, except they really come from a suburban town called Nanxiang which is 20km out of the city. The school I taught at last year was very close by, so we often got discounts. Great food and highly recommended.
Gu[1] Lao[3] Rou[4] Your standard sweet and sour pork dish
Fan[1] Qie[2] Chao[3] Dan[4] Another simple dish, this is fried eggs and tomatoes. If you're in Shanghai and really want to impress a waitress, say "Fei Ga Tso Dei", that's the Shangainese.
Jia[1] Chang[2] Dou[4] Fu A nice mix of thick tofu pieces, green peppers, and mushrooms.
Xi[1] Gua[1] Good watermelons for dessert
Steve
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Aug 12, 2004 0:13:51 GMT 7
Nice additions, Steve...thanks!
I also like another vegetable dish similar to one Steve mentions. I like Si1 Gua1 Chao3 Dan4 even better than the tomato version. Si Gua ("silk melon") I think is technically a kind of gourd, but don't be put off...works really well with the eggs.
|
|
wOZfromOZ
Charter Member and Old Chum
Posts: 419
|
Post by wOZfromOZ on Aug 12, 2004 11:29:39 GMT 7
Yes Steve
Thanks for that list - must have similar tastes - We also like all of the dishes you named here!
Rode past your highschool for the first time on Tuesday -did a 35 km bikeride from Jiading into Guyi Yuan (Yanchang) via some lovely country lanes. only problem is the heat!!!
Anybody who comes to Shanghai or already in Shanghai should have a look - It's a superb historic Chinese garden and there's the restaurant Steve's referring to near the southern entrance - great Xiao Long Bao and other food at prices much lower than Shanghai's exhorbitant rates.
wOZfromOZ
|
|
|
Post by con's fly is open on Aug 12, 2004 12:42:46 GMT 7
I just tried donkey meat for the first time. It's pretty good. There are apparently several varieties, each of which is very expensive. Ethically, compared to eating dog, this is a piece of cake.
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Aug 12, 2004 14:55:31 GMT 7
Yeah, donkey meat is really pretty good. For a long time I was pretty adamant that it should be left safely inside the donkey. I was converted by those luscious DongBei donkey-meat dumplings. (I'm considering A Fridge-Full of Donkey Meat Dumplings as a title for my book...)
Speaking of dumplings, Chinese food has about 100,000 items that translate into English simply as "dumplings". Here are a few of the best-known ones.
Jiao3 Zi A staple of Northern food, but a traditional Spring Festival food throughout China. Various combinations of minced meat and/or vegetables are mixed together, placed into a thin wheat flour-based wrapper, and the edges of the wrapper are crimped tightly to seal in the contents. These are thrown into boiling water...each time the water returns to a boil, the boil is doused with a little cold water. As more dumplings are cooked in the water, it becomes a light soup. The 3rd time the soup comes to a boil, the filling is thoroughly cooked and the jiaozi are served. Jiaozi are drained and put on a plate. They are always eaten with a dipping sauce, which can be as simple as a bit of red vinegar or soy sauce. My favorite sauce is made with equal parts of soy sauce and either red or white vinegar, a drop of sesame oil, and a manly dollop of chili sauce. In the north jiaozi are often served with minced garlic you can add to the sauce. This is also quite good, and allows you to smell like your neighbors. Jiaozi are often served with a bowl of the boiling soup on the side- considered extremely nutritious.
Hun2 Tun2 The Southern version. Known as "wontons" in the West. Functionally identical to jiaozi. The wrappers for huntun are thinner than those for jiaozi, and also larger. Pieces of the wrapper tend to fall off in the soup and become noodles. Unlike jiaozi, huntun are not drained- they're served in a bowl of the soup they are boiled in. You can add chili sauce, red vinegar, soy sauce, and/or powdered soup base to the soup. Huntun are divided into 2 size classes- Da4 Hun2 Tun2 (big wontons), which are typically 2 bites, and Xiao3 Hun2 Tun2 (small wontons) coming in at a single bite.
Guo1 Tie1 The "potstickers" often served in western Chinese restaurants, only better. They're basically jiaozi/huntun, perhaps with a bit thicker wrapper to stand up to the extra cooking. They are boiled to cook the filling, then fried in oil on one side. (Leftover jiaozi or da hun tun often become guo tie the next day.) Like jiaozi, they are dipped in a sauce when eating them. Beware the screaming hot oily "soup" that cooks up inside the dumpling- it tends to squirt everywhere when you bite into the dumpling. The soup is much prized by the Chinese, but I tend to poke a hole in the wrapper with my chopstick and let it drain out. By the way, IMHO guo tie are about as good as Chinese food gets at breakfast.
Bao1 Zi Maybe more a "steamed bun" than a dumpling? A patty of meat and/or assorted vegetables is wrapped in sheets of a yeast/flour dough, formed into a dome shape, and steamed. Sometimes you'll see a sweet version filled with red bean paste. Can vary in size from a small 1-2 bite affair, to monsters the size of your head.
Xiao3 Long2 A beloved favorite of the Shanghai region. Meat and/or vegetables are placed in a thin flour wrapper, formed into a dome shape, and steamed. Typically dipped in red vinegar or other sauce when eaten. I've seen foreigners (not me) devour 50 of these rascals in a single sitting.
Zong3 Zi Associated with Summer's Dragon Boat Festval. A payload of meat or a sweet Chinese date is coated with a layer of sticky rice to form a cake, which is shaped into a thick triangle. All this is wrapped in a banana leaf and steamed. The sweet ones, sprinkled with a touch of sugar, are acceptable at breakfast.
Tang1 Yuan2 Typically somewhat sweet, these are associated with the Lantern Festival that ends the Spring Festival season. A bit of sweet filling such as red bean paste or a peanut-and-sesame paste is somehow wrapped in a doughy mass of glutinous rice and formed into a ball. (There are also non-sweet tang yuan with meat) These are then boiled to cook the rice paste, and served in a bowl along with some of the water used to boil them. I like the peanut ones OK. However, to me they visually resemble a big bowl of boiled eyeballs...and they are often served at breakfast. Mmmmm.
|
|
Ruth
SuperDuperMegaBarfly
God's provisions are strategically placed along the path of your obedience.
Posts: 3,915
|
Post by Ruth on Aug 22, 2004 19:15:46 GMT 7
Here in Xingcheng our hot pot restaurants provide diners with individual pots, not the pot-in-the-center-of-the-table described above. The pots of water are placed on individual bunsen burner contraptions and each diner can fix his or her own soup to individual taste.
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Aug 24, 2004 21:46:25 GMT 7
OK, kids, I recently had the best dish I've ever encountered in China, maybe even the world.
I was in Hangzhou last week. I finished my business and told a taxi driver to take me somewhere with lots of restaurants. He suggested "Laowai Lu"....I thought this sounded like me, so I agreed.
He took me to Lou Wai Lou...a 150+-year-old restaurant right on one of the more picturesque edges of West Lake. And there on the menu, finally, was Beggar's Chicken- Jiao4 Hua1 Ji1. Turns out Lou Wai Lou is very famous for this dish. I'd been wanting to try it for years.
A lot of towns claim to be the birthplace of this dish; Hangzhou seems to be winning by sheer tourist volume. The story goes that a starving beggar had poached one of the Emperor's (or some other guy with whips and spears) chickens. As he was looking for a place to cook it, he heard soldiers coming...and holding this chicken would have meant his head. The beggar wrapped the bird in river weeds, coated the whole thing with mud, and threw it into the fire. When the guards rode up, he was in the clear. After they left, he fished the mudball out of the fire. Too hungry to not eat the chicken, he broke open the mudball...and was captivated by the odor of the cloud of steam that emerged.
Today the chicken is cut into pieces and seasoned with herbs, salt, and wine. The whole thing is wrapped in palm leaves (seems a hygienic layer of plastic wrap is also added now?) and then coated with clay mud. The whole thing is baked. When the chicken is cooked, the dish is brought to your table. A hammer blow cracks open the mud, and the wrapped chicken is extracted and set before you. The wrapping is cut open with scissors....and all these many years later, that steam cloud is still a rush.
By all means, try this dish if you can find it. Indescribably superb. If you can't get to Zhejiang Province, a lot of Chinese cities have Hangzhou, Shaoxing, or Zhejiang restaurants that can cook it.
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Aug 30, 2004 1:27:46 GMT 7
Our good friend Ruth, whom I already liked a lot anyway, suggested I copy my "Pot O' What" method of cooking here. I'm expanding into a discussion of rice in general.
Cooked rice is mi2 fan4 Uncooked rice is da4 mi2
Rice really is THE staple food of China. It's ubiquitous in the North despite all those wonderful wheat noodles, while in the South not eating rice with a meal is apparently considered a sign of a mental disorder and may be grounds for institutionalization. Despite what you may hear abroad, the Chinese generally don't eat only a bowl of unadorned white rice...but sometimes the diet for the poorer classes comes close to this. Mealtime for the masses still consists of a small bowl or two of white rice, with some vegetables and perhaps a few bites of meat on top. This is the "healthy Chinese diet" you hear so much about...very few expats eat this way, and the number of Chinese who do is decreasing with growing prosperity.
The small bowl of rice often sort of serves as a personal serving dish- a few bites of the other courses are often scooped onto the rice bowl, then eaten from there. It makes a great "staging area" for handling difficult bites with chopsticks, and the juices from the other food adds flavor to the rice. The dishes aren't generally mixed into the rice- there's usually a residue of plain white rice at the bottom of the bowl that is eaten to finish the meal. This apparently harks back to a time when meat and the more complex Chinese dishes like those familiar to Western diners were expensive treats- one would eat all the meat and delicacies one could, then when those ran out one would "fill up the corners" with rice and soup. In fact, soup is often added to the rice bowl to finish a meal even today.
Never stick the points of your chopsticks into the rice in a bowl so that the chopsticks stand on end. It resembles the incense offerings given the dead and is unsettling to your fellow diners.
There are many varieties of rice here! Although China now grows so much rice that they can export it, rice from Thailand is highly prized here for its flavor and aroma. Oddly enough, the best Chinese rice seems to come from the dry, cold Northeast- Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces. Ask a friend to help you find some Jilin Pearl rice sometime! Almost every place in China has its own local rice, and odds are it will all be better than what you got back home. For general dining the Chinese like a short grain rice cooked firm and not too sticky. There are also sticky rices here that are used for such dishes as Zong3 Zi; you may know this kind of rice from sushi as well. There's also a beast called glutinous rice that cooks up into an amorphous mass with no traces of individual grains left. This is used by the Chinese for a variety of snacks and dishes. I often wish they wouldn't, myself.
Chinese rice is invariably polished white. Unpolished brown rice is considered appropriate fare for religious ascetics and farm animals.
One highly recommended purchase is a rice cooker. Few Chinese homes are without one, and it makes the process of cooking perfect rice automatic. Take out the metal pot inside the cooker. Measure the amount of rice you want into it and wash the rice clean with a little tap water, draining off the wash water. Then pour in around twice the volume of water you used of rice. (TAP WATER IS FINE HERE! IT WILL BOIL!) The water should generously cover the rice in the pot. Put the pot into the cooker and put on its lid, plug the cooker to electricity, and push down the lever/button on the side of the cooker. The light on the side of the pot will change and you will hear a click. After a while, when the rice has boiled a bit, you'll hear a click and the light will change back. When the rice has sat another 15 minutes, unplug the cooker and the rice is ready to eat. Once you learn your preference for the rice/water ratio, it's almost impossible to mess up rice cooked this way.
Most rice cookers will come with a steamer basket that fits over the rice pot; the cooker lid will fit on the steamer. You can steam meats, vegetables, dumplings, Chinese breads....all manner of things in here with or without rice also cooking down in the pot.
Occasionally I'll cook up what I call a "Pot O' What" (In honor of Oklahoma's Potawatomi Tribe)...throw in the rice, then add some meat (smoked sausage and frozen shrimp are excellent together) and some chopped veggies, chicken powder, and spices, pour in some water with a bit of Shaoxing wine and soy sauce, press the button, and it's off to the Saloon until 15 minutes after the lights on the rice cooker change. Shamefully easy and the results are heavenly. You can make this dish as simple or as complex as you want...the above is just my own approach. I like it...a simple, delicious, potentially healthy and inexpensive way to eat. Ruth and others have reported good results too!
|
|
Ruth
SuperDuperMegaBarfly
God's provisions are strategically placed along the path of your obedience.
Posts: 3,915
|
Post by Ruth on Aug 30, 2004 6:38:10 GMT 7
Thanks for the recipe, Raoul, and for the commentary on rice.
We were given packets of glutinous (or sticky) rice wrapped in leaves on Dragon Festival/dead-poet-guy day in June. Tradition has it that rice was thrown into the river so that the fish would eat the rice instead of the drowned poet (can't remember his name, sorry). Our friends told us to steam them and then eat the rice with sugar. Could have sunk a battle ship with how heavy they are. The taste is okay if you can get past the texture.
|
|
xiaoyu
Charter Member and Old Chum
"Life is short, live it up!" - Kruschev / "Can you handle it?"
Posts: 177
|
Post by xiaoyu on Aug 30, 2004 14:59:13 GMT 7
I absolutely adore hot pot. Though I honestly don't think that the spicy side is very spicey. I had to ask the waiters up in DongBei to make it very spicey, and even then it didn't go above and beyond. I do love the dipping sauces (the tofu raoul mentioned i believe is fermented to a certain extent). Other great foods (IMHO): Turtle soup (Sichuan style) is called "jia yu tang" in Shenyang and Panjinshi (but i can't find the tonal specifications and i just say it.... believe it is 1,3,1) Spicy Cabbage (Korean style) is called "la4 bai2 cai4"
xiaoyu
|
|
|
Post by Raoul Duke on Aug 31, 2004 15:49:12 GMT 7
Xiaoyu, you're either really extreme on the peppers anyway, or were eating on the wrong restaurants. I'm a spicy food fiend, but a lot of the hot pot soups I've encountered take my head off!
|
|
xiaoyu
Charter Member and Old Chum
"Life is short, live it up!" - Kruschev / "Can you handle it?"
Posts: 177
|
Post by xiaoyu on Aug 31, 2004 16:06:58 GMT 7
guess i am really extreme! i had to ask the restaurants to make the dishes spicier. my actually fav breakfast (if i have to eat it) is la bai cai. but i would love it if i could eat hot pot 2xs a day.... at least. the spicier the better. had one dish (dont remember what it was called...) where fish meat was basically quick fried in hot oil with a lot of blackened chili peppers. you strained it out, but it was good. spicy and i could still get the oil/fat to keep me stable weight wise. don't worry, raoul, i will get you eating the hot stuff. and you will like it! xiaoyu
|
|
|
Post by ilunga on Sept 1, 2004 23:13:17 GMT 7
I'm well into the hotpot as well. Summer and winter, you just can't beat it. I challenge anyone to beat the meal I had last night for taste and value. Three of us, we had the grilled barbecue catfish, 9 lamb meat sticks, hotpot of potato, mushroom, frozen tofu and lettuce, and three large bottles of local beer. Total price - a whopping 30RMB. I also love the fact I can order everything without having to resort to the dreaded pointing or, worse still, body language. Have you ever tried acting out potato?
This is a great thread Raoul. Any chance you could give us the pin yin for a few other tasty dishes? Even though I know a few characters, it's pretty painful trying to work out exactly what the dish is from the menu. Whenever I resort to pot-luck I end up ordering something almost inedible.
|
|
|
Post by ilunga on Sept 1, 2004 23:15:55 GMT 7
I forgot to mention, we had that yummy grilled bread as well. The stuff that's quite salty and a little tangy. Love that stuff
|
|