Now I cannot in good faith say that on the whole Chinese food will always be healthier to eat than American food, I can only say that it tastes better as a rule. On the right is a picture of some various dishes and I have no idea what their names are. I know that in the middle is a soup made with fish and in the top right corner is a dish which is like a boiled pork dumpling. Apart from that the only name these foods need is good.Most Chinese food stresses the freshness of the ingredients to accentuate the flavors that they prefer to use. On top of this, the Chinese love to eat and won't travel anywhere that does not include the possibility of food. On the left are several absolutely divine dishes.
The red and white dish just behind the duck is Mapoa Dofu (Tofu in a spicy sauce) which is perhaps of the best commonly prepared dishes in china and is a hallmark of the Sichuan cuisine. All of these dishes are in fact Sichuan ones, the duck is called Tea Smoked Duck which has a rich flavor while being somewhat mild at the same time. On the far left is an Eel and peers dish in which fresh peices of eel (the same used in Japaneses sushi) is stirfried with various peppers to give it a spiced flavor along with the natural sweetness of the meat. On the right is a delicate soup made with pork and winter melon which made for a subtle yet exquisite treat. In Sichuan, the province ChengDu is in, much of the food was reliably like this.
Still if Restaurants aren't your thing Chengdu has a rich food culture for something that doesn't really translate well into English. ShauChi (you need to tones to really hear the word since Chi in fourth tone sounds more like Chur) really means small eats, but it is the local street food. You walk from vendor to vendor buying small things that they specialize in.These dishes varried from roasted chicken, spicy boiled meats, and pineapple rice to Stinky tofu, "Three Big Bombs" a dish with doughy rice in a sweet sauce, and various juices. The above picture is of one of the many traditional streets littered throughout he city of Chengdu where you can go shopping, have and drink, and be relatively close to a place to buy ShauChi.
Eventually however you are done eating, for the moment, and something else is in order. Drinking tea is a nice calming way to pass the time. There are several places from the tea market, a district of the town devoted to tea shops and paraphernalia of all levels of quality, to small shops that will give you a cup of tea to drink while you look at the local scenery or just relax.
This tea spot was actually located within one of the old Taoist Temples in the city. I will put up pictures of the breath taking surrounds of the temple itself soon enough. The tea was a little strongly brewed and as you can see was completely loose leaf. Apart from a Korean "tea" called DaMaiChe (roasted wheat tea) no one in china uses those sissy little tea bags you American's are so keen on.Now the tea shown in the picture above is a great deal more common in its quality and mode of consumption than what I partake of on my free Mondays. Above we have a simple Jasmine Green tea which was over steeped by virtue of how it was served. This tea was served to us in a larger cup which was filled with hot water whenever it ran out, the tea would steep while we talked and was a little too strong because they included more tea than was really necessary in the cup to insure that it would last over many infusions.
When I drink tea and home or on my Monday outings to a shop with some very attractive and friendly young women working in it we drink it in a more, well Americans would consider it more ceremonial, but really in a more high class manner. The tea is steeped in something about the size of the cups above (actually it is one of the cups above) and then poured into a glass teapot where we can admire the color. After this it is poured into small cups which hold about a mouthful at a time because with a really good tea you don't need more than a little bit to get the experience. This is not to say that the good teas have strong or distinctive flavors, far from it in fact, but rather the experience than really separates tea from other beverages is the way it lingers in the mouth after you drink it. Today I bought myself a very nice tea set (6 small cups, 1 large cup like the one above for steeping the tea in and a ceramic pot for pouring the tea all done in very nice Chinese ceramics and delicately painted). I also bought some Chinese white and red teas (black teas for you english speakers. The Chinese term from what we call black tea is red tea, this is very different from the African red teas). These teas should fit nicely with my DaMaiChe and green Oolong tea that I had previously bought. The white tea is of a very high quality and has been aged for 6 years (aged teas almost always have much improved tastes), and the red teas are separated to the cheap batch which I bought for a breakfast tea and the more delicate one for an after work relaxation tea or a midday tea and snacks tea.
Getting back to ChengDu and other parts of China however and away from my recent absorbtion into the tea High Culture, one of the places I ate and drank while on my trip at the begining of October was in a theater which put on a variety show showcasing many local traditional arts. The tea was also a decent quality green jasmine which was drank right out of the steeping cup but the overall food experience was wonderful. For 80RMB extra we had full neck and uper body massages and ear cleanings while we drank tea.
After wards we were placed at a table with snacks which included wafers made out of dried cherries and some kind of dried pea. The snacks were pretty good and the show was quite entertaining especially because there was little speaking that was needed to understand what was going on. For myself and my friends one of the highlights of the night were the folk dancers simply because they were simply divine looking young women. The city of ChengDu in particular and the province of Sichuan at large is known for producing some very beautiful women and I will allow you to be the judge of how well it holds up to this criteria. I honestly can say that I can count the women I have known who were as attractive as many of the women I saw on my trip on my hands.
Food wise though I am loving China. I will have more food related posts in the future especially when I start learning to cook more than I am. Currently I occasionally fry some eggs or go buy stuff for my roommate to cook.
