We are surprised that this is our first blog post dedicated just to food, but better late than never. We were both so excited about the foods we would get to eat along the way and have so far aside from the times one or both of us were sick, we have really liked the food. As you all should know by now, we love food, one of us maybe a bit more than the other, but none the less we both like to cook, eat, and enjoy food. As we traveled through SE Asia we took a few cooking classes and tried to sample the local food as much as possible and only on occasion gave into our Western cravings of pasta or cereal. China however has been a whole different story...
This is really the first place we have been where we have found very limited English, particulrly when it comes to restaurant menus. One of our biggest fears so far, particularly after seeing a few of the English menus and realizing what being offered, is going somewhere and having to "point and hope" in order to have a meal. The menus almost always seem to contain animal parts that we don't eat back home such as feet, hooves, intestines, heart, testicles, shark fins, and other unmentionables. We thought we were pretty adventurous eaters, but turns out we are pretty tame and have very American-like eating habits that we are not very willing to change.
In Hong Kong we got a jar of peanut butter and have been using it along with a few other items we got in Beijing for "emergencies." We also have to confess to giving into several Western meals at our hostel, but the alternatives are not very appealing. We have had a few good dishes almost all of which involve eggplant (boy do they cook a mean eggplant) and dumplings. The rest of their food is far from desirable and is either floating in oil and or in an orange viscous sauce that covers up the taste of whatever it is you might be eating. Needless to say the comfort foods we have been looking forward to for the last 6-months will seem even better now after eating our way through China.
We will leave you with some tidbits from an English menu we ate from the other night. These are direct quotes (we took the menu back after ordering and copied them down), none of which we made up and thankfully there were pictures for these dishes which only helped 50% of the time. Enjoy our "lost in translation" meal...It was actually one of our better meals so far if that says anything at all. We did not have any of these below in case you were wondering:
Self Made Frozen Skin
Since the Constraints Flowers
Assorted Brine
West House Donkey (yes they do eat donkey meat so that part we know is correct)
West House Saliva Chicken
Cordycepts Reference Crispy
Tofu Spiced Corned Egg Flight
Bumper Crop
Small Potatoes Burn Tsai Pai
Sands Signs Shrimp
Whistle Burning Perch
Wild Mushroom Little Flaky Meat
Smell of the Urine Mixed with Dried
Beef with Thai Pepper Cake Explosion
Well, that's all for now folks. Eat your hearts out!
T&V
