Special Meals in China

Image: Taken 6/10/07 at the Quanjude Restaurant, Hepingmen location. The chef is cutting the roast duck into nice thin slices for us. The thinner he can cut it, the more skilled he is. As you can tell from the mask on the chef, this is a pretty upscale and sanitary place, even though my camera makes it look darker than it really is.

We were well fed in China, with three full meals every day. Breakfast was always at the hotel, and usually consisted of a buffet with mixed Western and Chinese foods. Lunch and dinner were generally at restaurants which were clearly tourist joints, or part of some hotel. That meant that we were given lots of food at each meal, always spread over some 7 to 9 courses. Unfortunately, the food tended to be quite boring. Regardless of what part of China we were in, the menus stayed pretty static. However, we were treated to several special meals, ranging from the most famous Beijing Roast Duck restaurant in Beijing to an authentic noodle joint. This is a summary of the five most outstanding meals that we enjoyed while staying in China.

Real Local Noodle Place (6/9/07)
The genuine noodle joint in Beijing was the only non-touristy restaurant that we ate at during the whole trip. It was a popular local joint, bustling with activity, and was not nearly as “sheltered” as the other places we ate at. The large room was very hot and filled with continuous motion and with the shouting of orders. The appetizers were very interesting, including one dish with sliced pear and sliced haw, which actually made a nice combination. We were also served, for the first time, the awesome fruit-wrapped-in-a-dough-ball-topped-off-by-caramelized-sugar dish. I wish I knew the name of the dish, but all I know is that it was awesome. We were served many variations of this dish throughout our tour. Anyway, the main course was a bowl of noodles which was virtually bottomless. Well, some people did finish, most notably, Mr. Bickel who polished off his entire bowl while I was still mixing in the sauce. But it was a seriously large helping of noodles, which was quite tasty and very authentic. The fact that they gave us full 2-liter bottles of soda to share, instead of just a single glass of Sprite, also made me very happy, since I was extraordinarily thirsty after touring Tiananmen Square and the Temple of Heaven.

Quanjude Roast Duck (6/10/07)
The Quanjude Roast Duck restaurant at Hepingmen was probably the best place we ate on the whole trip. It was clearly an upscale restaurant. Outside of the large five story building, the parking lot felt like an Audi showroom, and was packed with tons of black Audi A8s, the car of choice for the rich in Beijing. And many of them even had the range-topping W12 engine (a true sign of wealth since China’s gas-guzzler tax will cost you an arm and a leg, as well as your first-born child.) Since it was such a nice place, the restaurant was visited by many famous people including former president, Richard Nixon. The Quanjude Roast Duck restaurant was among the cleanest we dined in, and the bathrooms even had an attendant to point you to the open urinals (as if I couldn’t tell by myself.) The food was also great, with a nice selection of appetizers, and the main course coming in the form of four whole, specially prepared, Beijing roast ducks. A chef came and thinly sliced the duck for us, and we were given these mini-lotus pancakes which we were supposed to wrap the slices of duck and leeks with. The wraps tasted heavenly. Yet, the table I sat on ended up eating far fewer wraps than the other table. But our excuse is that they had Chris Wong, Misha Han, and Matt Kor, the three biggest eaters on the entire trip…and my table had me, the already skinny person who would lose nearly ten pounds over the course of the trip. Doh.

Dumpling Feast (6/14/07)
We got this dumpling feast added to our itinerary by special request. We were supposed to have to pay extra for it, but the wonderful tour agency just covered the extra cost for free. Each table setting included a small porcelain glass of a whitish liquid, which the waitress told us was rice wine. Chen Laoshi wanted the wine removed before we could intoxicate ourselves, but she was somehow convinced to chill and turn a blind eye to the “special-soda.” The wine was nice and sweet, but had a bit of powdery residue at the bottom. And as for all the panic about us being served alcohol, I have grapes in the back of my refrigerator with higher alcohol content than that wine. Anyway, the feature of the dumpling feast was the eating contest. However, the dumplings were served such that there was only one of each type per person, so it turned into more of an endurance contest. I, Jonathan Fung, pooped out after 12, (which I still assert was NOT the fewest number consumed in our group.) Lindsay Kosasa and Grace McLane both doubled me with a ridiculous 24 dumplings each. Chris “food disposal” Wong won, with a total of over 25 (by consuming the dumplings that I didn’t eat.) As for the dumplings themselves, we had a wide variety of fillings ranging from vegetables to squid to abalone to walnut to pork. There’s a Harry Potter reference somewhere here…. Anyway, the dumplings were often decorated to look like the fillings inside, so it was quite artistic. But man, only 12 dumplings…how embarrassing.

Hot Pots! (6/15/07)
The first task at the hot pot restaurant (aside from washing our hands) was to make our own dipping sauce. They had a table laid out with all kinds of ingredients for us to choose from. I don’t want to brag, but my sauce was awesome, fragrant, and had absolutely perfect taste. Simplicity wins: a soy-sauce base, with a dash of peppers for spice, a touch of sesame oil for fragrance, and just a pinch of green onions for fun. On the other hand, I don’t have any idea what Katie Cannell put in hers, but it smelled weird and tasted pretty funky. Then again, she would prove just how good of a cook she is, by cracking an egg into my hot pot…and getting a bit of shell in there as well. It looked even grosser when it started to cook with an uneven foamy texture. Anyhow, it was a good meal, and I ate a lot (unlike at the dumpling feast.) For dessert, we had these heavenly fried bread balls with condensed milk, although the girls (specific names will NOT be mentioned) hogged all the condensed milk for themselves. The surprise of the meal however, came when I accidentally lit my napkin on fire. We each had our own personal hot pot kept warm by our own little flame underneath. Suddenly, Marissa Sakoda starts pointing frantically at me. I looked to see if there was a giant spider crawling on my chest. Nope. The corner of my napkin had touched the flame keeping my hot-pot warm and had caught fire. Thinking quickly, I grabbed it and stuck it in the water of the hot pot. SAFE! Didn’t even need to stop drop and roll.

Tea House (6/17/07)
The tea house in Guilin was a pretty neat meal. The restaurant had the distinction of having been visited by the former first lady, Hillary Clinton. They even had pictures of her on the wall, and put a special distinctive plaque on the chair she sat in. Unfortunately, Bill wasn’t there with her…which sort of makes you wonder. But anyway, the food there was extraordinarily ornate. The soup was decorated to look like a yin-yang symbol, vegetables were laid out on the dish to look like a fan, taro was shaped into a fish, dumplings were made to look like passengers on a cucumber raft, and everything just looked fabulous. The taste? Oh, the taste was all there too. It was good eats.