Chinese food at home is delicious and fun!
One year in China! Shameful that this post is my first in over a year. I have been having such fun, that I haven’t made time for writing. That changes…NOW!
I have discovered so much in the last year, been to many other places in China, met so many interesting people. Where to begin?
Let’s begin here at home: Ningbo. A San Francisco-sized city of about 8 million people, it is China’s 34th largest city. It’s location on the coast makes seafood the staple of every table. Most other expats consider the local fare to be boring (fish with lots of bones) and usually over salted. Sad to say, their taste buds agree with mine with some very tasty exceptions. It isn’t awesome, unless you know where to go! There is a hole-in-the-wall serving up traditional Ningbo cuisine just off the beaten path that I have discovered and it is amazing! Razor clams, a ground pork and egg dish that has a sauce you’ll want to bathe in, excellent potato dishes (more on these later), and tofu dishes that would convert even the staunchest carnivores into… well, tofu lovers. The food is fantastic and they will cook things any way you want them to, but more details about this place later. The point is, even in a third-tier Chinese city with a foodie culture that pales in comparison with those of its northern counterparts, there is a lot of excellent food to be had here.
The Backstreet at night
The universities here usually have a lot of great street food nearby, and the one near my neighborhood has a fantastic selection of carts, stalls, and booths selling anything from raw sugarcane to noodles to stinky tofu. We call it The Backstreet, since that’s what our colleagues call it in Chinese. It’s really a great way to try a little bite of many different things, and it has a youthful, energetic, student atmosphere that is hard to beat. Great with a group of friends after work! The vendors are always eager to talk with you, as not many foreigners go there, so it’s a great way to practice your language skills as well as delight your palate.
Most of China’s cuisines are represented here, of which the Dongbei ( 东北) restaurants are my favorite (today, anyways, maybe Sichuan (四川) hot pot tomorrow). There are a lot of options, so I don’t think people who complain about the food here are trying at all. In fact, those are the people who eat a lot of KFC, Pizza hut, and McDonald’s (what a waste of a good opportunity for tasty meals). They can’t be trusted, in my opinion. At least not in regards to food advice.
That brings me to western food, which can be easily found in the areas where laowai (foreigners) hang out at night. It isn’t hard to find Indian, Lebanese, Mexican, American, Thai, Filipino, Greek/Turkish, Japanese, and Italian food, just to name a few. Not as many options as say, Shanghai (two hours away), but there are plenty of them.
Here’s a sample of some of my favorite discoveries over the last year, to be talked about in more detail later:
The roujiamo lady! She's working her magic, about to assemble.
My absolute favorite street food- the roujiamo (肉夹馍). The name literally means “meat wedged in steamed bun” and there is no sandwich that compares to it! The bread is not really steamed, but fried or grilled (like a thick pita, but not dry), and there’s chopped up meat (usually pork) that has been stewing in a broth or sauce for hours stuffed inside together with some veggies or whatever you like. It is delightful, and filling, especially good when there’s a chill in the air! There is a lady who used to make these heavenly sandwiches at The Backstreet. She was so full of smiles and happiness, that I think that’s partly why her food tasted so good. Unfortunately she has traded her chopping block in for a different cart, and now makes really good spicy fried bread. I admit, I don’t go to The Backstreet nearly as often anymore, knowing that there is no more roujiamo to be had. I can only hope that when winter hits, she’ll bring back the old cart! I haven’t found anywhere else that can make them like she did, except for a small mom and pop place in Hangzhou, and they were very good but very different. And that’s hours away. I’m having withdrawal…
A guilty pleasure that I can’t seem to resist, a staple on my way to Chinese class, and great hangover breakfast- the handy-cake. That’s what all the foreigners call them, because all the little booths and stalls that sell them say “Taiwan Handwork Cake” in English. It’s really called shou zhua bing (手抓饼). It means “hand grab bread.” Basically it’s a flaky pancake that is folded around the filling, which could be many things depending on where you get it. My favorite is egg and bacon with hot sauce and seafood sauce. There are many different fillings, but more on that later. They are a little greasy, and very tasty! It can’t possibly be good for you, hence the guilt factor. I want one right now. (Apparently, Handy Cakes are so good and distracting, I’ve never taken a photo. Well, I promise no less than a video on how they are made soon! How’s that?)
Boiling our newly formed jiaozi! We made a fried version too, which we would call Pot Stickers back home. Both were incredible!
An old friend, jiaozi (饺子), more commonly known as dumplings, is a dish very familiar to most people who like western Chinese food. The ones we made with friends the other day were epic! Truly worth all the time it takes to make the dough and fillings. Boil them, steam them, fry them, or deep fry them, any way is good! Half the fun is making them with friends and laughing at each other when you mess one up. We made two different fillings- pork and green onion, and pork, onion, mushroom, and white cabbage. Both were really nice. Good friends are a must for this experience! Susie, my Chinese cuisine teacher, friend, and a great source of information on Chinese delicacies, did all the hard work.
She is always moving! That's what's required if your going to make radish cakes. Once a body is in motion, (as you well know) a body stays in motion. C'mon people, it's physics! And when you cook with physics it's always tasty!
Another favorite is what I call a radish cake. I have no idea what it is really called. I have been ordering these from a woman at The Backstreet who looks like this is the only thing she’s ever done in her life. It doesn’t sound that interesting, especially when radishes aren’t a big part of your daily eating habits. I’m pretty sure it’s just shredded daikon radish and some kind of batter deep fried until golden brown. It looks like it could be potato, and tastes like it a little. It’s usually so hot I can’t hold it and I’ve burned my mouth being impatient more often than not. Patience is key, let them cool down for a few minutes, but wait too long and the plastic bag it comes in will make it soggy. Still good, but soggy. Crispy is better, trust me!
An unexpected treat that I can’t believe I’ve never had before: razor clams! These are one of the treats I discovered at the small Ningbo specialty restaurant, and oh, mama, they are delicious! Part of the reason I love shellfish so much is because my lovely wife is allergic to bicuspids (any shellfish with a hinge, that is), and so I rarely cook things she can’t eat, and more often than not at restaurants we order things to share. So when our friends ordered razor clams my first time at this restaurant and because Susie is a vegetarian and Mrs. Kelly is allergic, DK and I at the whole plate ourselves. They were easy to get out of the shell with chopsticks, but using your fingers is acceptable! They were very flavorful, seasoned with a little salt, garlic, green onion, and nothing else. Then grilled on a metal plate and served piping hot, moist, tender, not rubbery, and tasting like the ocean in the best way imaginable. Ten minutes earlier, they were happy little clams relaxing in a plastic tub of sea water along with many other tubs of fish and sea animals. They were excellent. I found them at the Outdoor Market a few weeks later and tried to make them at home using the the broiler in my toaster oven. Fantastic. Maybe the best part is that I bought them live, just as they had been in the restaurant, and they cost 10 rmb for half a kilo. That’s really cheap, about $1.50 per pound. That’s right. Living in China has some really nice perks. (sorry, lost my excellent photo, dammit!)
Details to come on these subjects and many, many more!
More to come soon!
