Foodie adventures in China, sort of

...ok, not quite. To be fair it wasn't a food trip or anything so I tried my best to document whatever interesting -- though slightly vile for some -- foods I could capture before I was being left behind on the streets by the group; or before someone started poking their chopsticks into a communal dish.

It was my first trip to China (a picture-heavy post available on my style site Styleplume--I left the strange pictures for here) and wasn't sure of what the southern province of Yunnan had in store. The general consensus was that the food would suck, or rather pale in comparison to the cuisine of other provinces more well known for their food (Beijing, Shanghai). Boy was I craving Peking duck and Xiao Long Bao. Well not really. Ok maybe XLB.

The consensus was right. Not even being Chinese helped in appreciating the humble dishes of the Motherland. Well not in my case anyway as my proficiency in Mandarin is zero to none. That, and I'm Malaysian which goes to show that though Chinese, I am still foreign. I have a high tolerance for abysmal food in the sense that even if it looks meager, I'd try it the first time and if it's shit I'll just not eat it again. But being somewhat accustomed to Chinese cuisine over the years, Yunnan really takes the cake for boring, uninventive dishes. I will speak of the let down that was the infamous "Cross-over-bridge noodles" or "Rainbow-bridge noodles" or "half-assedly-made-lukewarm-excuse-of-human-fodder", later in the post.

First things first. Yak.

We were in the highland city of Lijiang and this was yak territory. Hence yak milk, yak cheese, yak cheese dough fritters, yak jerky, yak yogurt drink (pictured above), yak coats, and yak flavoured things like candy I'm sure. The drink was pleasant and tasted like any plain yogurt drink but became increasingly frustrating to drink as it wasn't chilled. I met a yak in person and its gaze proved somewhat intelligent and soulful. I felt really bad for eating yak jerky after.

Every meal looked like this; communal dishes to be shared and everyone was polite enough to not selfishly gobble up the nice stuff. During this meal, a lady came by offering us (in what I could understand, given my idiot-mandarin) "complimentary rice wine" which, in its defence for being unlike rice wine, wasn't really rice wine. Basically cheap half-fermented stuff. The motive? She was selling the cups and rice wine keeper-pot thing. Oh and every meal came with two large bottles of local beer and our choice of either Sprite or Coke. Not bad if they didn't forget to chill these beforehand or provide some goddamn ice. So I had hot tea with every meal instead, which proved mildly satisfying as I'm more of a tea person. Maybe the province was running low on ice-making facilities? Maybe the eatery's freezer broke (one place actually said this)? I'd like to think they're just heartless beings.

Oh and here it is, the bane of my existence. The noodles frivolous as they were, served no purpose. It was just a disappointing interlude to our meal of emaciated roast duck-- a local specialty, so I was told-- stir-fried leaves and near-unidentifiable meat dishes. Our guide warned us beforehand to heed the boiling hot soup when sliding the noodles in as the heat was required to cook the quail egg that came with it. Fair enough, even the waiters winced in agony as they placed the bowls in front of us. I slid the ingredients in. And nothing happened. To the egg, I mean. It just sat at the bottom of the bowl in mucoid consistency, unfazed by the heat. WHAT HEAT? I sipped the soup and it was lukewarm at best. What's worse than a cold dish that's supposed to be hot? A tasteless one. What is it about these famous shite-bridge noodles again? To be honest, we were probably served haphazardly being tourists and all. This adds to their aforementioned heartlessness.

The other famous provincial dish was a mushroom hotpot course. Poisonous wild mushrooms were cooked up in a broth for some 15 minutes or so before they were deemed safe to eat. Our waiter had to ask another for advice on whether the mushrooms were ready to eat. Very reassuring for us, I'm sure. I actually love hotpots and the magic that happens to the broth being infused with the flavour of every ingredient. This, did not happen with this meal. The soup was tasty the first time round and as more ingredients were added on a course by course basis, more plain stock was added to the pot; diluting the broth and rendering the infusion with previous ingredients' magic juices an utter waste of effort. No hotpot magic to happen here. Also the fishballs were pasty and dough-like in texture. See what I said about them being heartless? 

Now for some street-food. 

 A --very-- salty tofu skewer which I now regret finishing. If looks could deceive, this tofu stick has it down. During the occasions we were served dishes devoid of seasoning, this would've been most opportune. 

The above two were delicious. Finally Yunnan gets something right; grilled squid and marinated lamb skewers. I am not a fan of lamb per se but these yummy morsels didn't reek of gaminess (I may have confused lamb with the gaminess of goat here) and were melt-in-the-mouth tender. Ok maybe not that melty but for meat, it was juicy enough to warrant seconds. 

Hands-down the best mango pudding I've ever had, ever. I would go back to Yunnan just for this. I'm not even kidding. (I am. But it was really good.)

This drink was nice too. At least it was cold. Grabbed it straight from the chiller myself. Take that, heartless China. Just to clear things up a bit, I'm not deeming all the food in Yunnan unpalatable or bastardly. We were just unlucky to be fed tourist fodder most of the time, hence my bitter sentiment. 

Had these noodles at the airport. They proved to be a good last meal in Yunnan as by this time, after days of being force-fed food slightly above being edible, I couldn't be arsed to look for poncy airport grub or anything familiar to more westernised palates (I didn't go about hunting for the one KFC either as I don't eat fast food anyway; I sincerely mean this in a non-derogatory way). We had noodles like this served during breakfast at two hotel buffets and they're hearty and good. I suggest this over shite-bridge noodles anytime but I don't know the actual name of the dish other than that it has a savoury pork mince added to noodles in plain broth.

Below stands a Coke can in all its Chinese glory. Know what it says? Well, Coca-cola. Duh. I don't normally drink Coke but I did for the sake of not wanting to spend ten times more on Pu'er tea; and just out of sheer curiosity on what Chinese Coke would taste like. Unsurprisingly, it tasted of coke. What was I thinking.

Here I've saved the best for last. Feast your eyes on vacuum-packed creature parts (there's a root vege somewhere in there) sold at a truck stop; chicken feet individually packed for ready-to-eat convenience. 

Dubious-looking cartilage-laden bits of pig skin?

"More taste, more excellent".  Uh, no. Just no.

I joked about surprising non-Asian friends with a chicken foot as a souvenir. Should've done it. 

Well that's all for now. Hope you enjoyed the post!

Vanessa

(This post is sorta dedicated to Edwin Congreave and his brilliant but lazy food blog http://tour-bar-blues.blogspot.com. Thanks for inspiring me to update mine!)