Chinese Food Daily Diary: Day Five

This is a week long series on the different Chinese food I eat on a regular basis. To start at the beginning, click here. I’m not including breakfast because I eat the same thing, yoghurt, every day so I don’t feel that a picture is necessary. I try to describe the ingredients as best I can, so you can get a good idea of what real Chinese food is like, but often times I don’t even know myself!
Lunch: Back to the same restaurant we went to on Monday. It’s a new restaurant and is big, clean and very sunny.
We went with a friend who speaks fluent Chinese so we knew exactly what we were getting for lunch which almost never happens when Ryan and I go by ourselves.
On the left is eggplant in “fish essence” which is like a type of fish sauce. It doesn’t taste fishy at all, more like hoison sauce. There are also small slices of bamboo shoots and some red peppers. On the right is beans which were crisp and delicious. There are little bits of pork in the beans as well.
Meat is not often the main focus of a dish but it is in pretty much everything. I’ve heard that it is hard to be a vegetarian in China because they don’t think about the little pieces of meat as being meat. That is, you could ask if the dish has any meat and they will, in all seriousness, say no. But of course when it comes it has little bits of pork in it.
We also got one of my generally favorite Chinese dishes: homestyle tofu.
It is crispy and fried on the outside but smooth on the inside, almost the consistency of custard. Tofu is another type of food the Chinese know how to do right. They don’t try to use it for “fake meat” or to sneak a little protein in a dish like we do. Instead they serve it as its own dish.
Dinner: It’s a cafeteria meal again. This was probably the worst meal yet. I chose something new, just by pointing at the picture, and it was pretty yuck-o.

It had these gross slices of some sort of grey/beige mystery meat. There were slivers of something we couldn’t decide if they were fish or mushrooms. There was a fried egg, bok choy and spring onion slices in it as well. The broth was virtually tasteless and the whole thing wasn’t very good. This was the only meal this week that I didn’t like which I consider a victory. Seeing as when we go to a restaurant we never know what we are ordering, so one unhappy meal over the week is a success.
That was my week of food, I hope you enjoyed the tour! As you can tell, we eat out almost every meal. Eating out is not only less of a hassle but cheap. In general all of my meals costs no more than $2 per person, with the average price being just under a buck. Often times at restaurants the food comes with free sunflower seeds (in the shell) and a pot of green tea to drink.
Eating is one of the biggest adventures you will have in China. And if you ever have the opportunity to try real Chinese food, like from a friend’s old grandmother, don’t pass it up, and don’t be too afraid. (Although you may want to ask if chicken feet will be involved!)