Fine Dining

Over the last week I've had the chance to try several different kinds of Asian food, including Japanese, Taiwanese, local Chinese, and Korean Barbecue restaurants. All of them have been delicious.

Last night we ate at a traditional Chinese restaurant. We ordered tea service. It was a table-side ceremony. They began by using the boiling hot water to rinse out (wash) the teacups. Then they steeped the tea in a porcelain cup, then transferred it to a porcelain server, then filled our teacups. It was a bottomless teacup too. I’ve ordered hot tea here four times now. Two out of four times, it has smelled like fish… according to Tanaka-san, that’s a sign that the restaurant used tap water.

I’ve had excellent vegetarian dishes already that I want to try to duplicate. Last night we had an appetizer of raw cucumbers that had been soaked in some kind of soy vinegar with chives and garlic cloves (hot red peppers optional). We’ve also had vegetables in the form of leeks and other greens sautéed in olive oil and big chunks of garlic, served hot. This is already one of my favorite dishes. I’ve also had a couple of delicious eggplant dishes, served with a mild vinegar barbecue sauce or topping, sometimes brought to the table sizzling in a skillet. Ryan is quickly learning how to use chopsticks – the waitresses really enjoyed watching us with our dinner last night!
I’ve also been told that this region is famous for their cuisine. The popular expression is that the Cantonese people will eat anything in the air except airplanes, anything in the water except boats. They have gotten very inventive with raw materials, sauces, and cooking methods in this part of the country so menus are just fascinating (and a bit scary at times). They are famous for their dim sum. Rice is a staple – rice noodles, fried rice, rice gruel known as congee. Their food differs from Sichuan (from the western side of China – hot and spiced) and Taiwanese. Northern food utilizes more wheat-based products.
Lunch today (above) was a local Chinese restaurant. We had our own private dining room, complete with lounge area and bathroom! Again we rinsed our teacups out with hot water at the table. Plate after plate of food was brought out to us. Boiled peanuts, spicy cucumbers, fried eggplant, fried rice with leeks, hot spicy chicken, some kind of duck or goose, some sort of cold green vegetable dipped in soy/wasabi sauce, soup cooked with pork bones. It was all delicious! Our coworker, Candy, who is from this part of China and speaks perfect English, ordered everything for us. That's the hard part!

Dinner (below) was at a Korean Barbecue restaurant. These restaurants have grills built into each tabletop. The waitress brought us several small dishes of vegetables, then platters of raw meat which she then cooked in front of us at our table. We had cow tongue, beef ribs, some kind of unsalted bacon, mushrooms, cold radish soup, hot spicy tofu and beef soup, pumpkin congee, hot tea, and Korean beer.

Every coworker I’ve spoken with who has traveled to this part of China has told me I can expect to lose weight. At this rate, I will be the only person I know who has managed to gain weight on this kind of work assignment!!!