This post has been long overdue.
I have been in China for ten months and in that time I have been eating
a lot of Chinese food. In previous posts
I have talked a little bit about food especially in regards to food eaten for
special festivals. If you are curious, yes Chinese food is delicious. This
is going to be my attempt at describing some of the food that is common.
First a little overall description about food in China. A meal usually consist of two parts one being
a carbohydrate which is also known as “staple food.” The main staple foods are
rice, noodles, steamed bread, dumplings, and porridge. The second part is known
simply as “cai” which literally translates to vegetables. Luckily another translation is “dish” or
“course.” In fact meat consumption is
very common and there is a lot of meat.
So I think it is ironic to have the second part possibly mean vegetable
when so much meat is eaten here. This second part is usually laid out and is a
communal plate for everyone to grab from while getting a single bowl of a
staple food for yourself. Of course chopsticks are the main eating
utensil. Now Chinese chopsticks are a
little different from Korean style chopsticks but not that hard to figure out.
China is a huge country and so that does mean a lot of differences in
the cuisine from place to place. So in general it is more common to eat rice
down south and noodles up north. Up
where I live now wheat products are popular especially in the cooler
months. Spicier food is typically found down south. Of course these are blanket
statements and you can find all of these things anywhere when eating in China. It depends who you ask but overall there is a
consensus of eight main cuisines from mainland China: Anhui, Fujian, Hunan,
Jiangsu, Szechuan, Zhejiang, Cantonese, and Shandong. Then outside of mainland China you have
Singaporean, Malaysian, Indonesian, Indian and American Chinese cuisine (these
places is because where a lot of Chinese have migrated). Back to the mainland China. I will quickly
mention one cuisine and go into detail about another cuisine.
Cantonese cuisine is the Chinese cuisine that Westerners speak of when
talking about Chinese food. This is because this is where most of the Chinese
emigrants originate from in China. In China it is from Guandong China area and
in fact this is also where the Cantonese language originates from as well. Many cooking methods are used but with
steaming and stir frying being the most favored ways to cook. Some common ingredients in Cantonese cuisine
include spring onion, sugar, salt, soy sauce, rice wine, vinegar, scallion, and
sesame oil. Honestly here in China I
haven’t eaten much of this style of cooking because I haven’t been down in that
region much.
The next cuisine that I want to discuss is Shandong cuisine. This is because I had been living in Jining
which is located in Shandong providence and so I have eaten a lot of this
cuisine. So for some dishes it is very
common to have seafood and this obviously does depend on where you are at in
Shandong. Jining isn’t near the sea and
so I was used to the non-sea food dishes.
So besides the sea food part other things that are common are maize
(similar to corn), peanuts, grains (often made into porridge), staple
vegetables, and vinegar (richer vinegar than usual and special to this
region). So there are a lot of good
vegetable based dishes that are common in Jining such as: qiezi (egg
plant), wawa cai (baby cabbage), xihongshi he jidan (egg and tomatoes), lian ou (lotus
roots), peppers, mogul (mushrooms), and dasuan (garlic). Again some of these have meat incorporated into them such as stuffed
lotus roots (very delicious) and stuffed peppers. Those are some of the vegetable/ main dishes
that we would get. So when at a
restaurant you order multiple dishes and everyone shares them. When it was just us foreigners we would try
to get some vegetable dishes without meat and then the dishes that had both of
them so that way we could balance our food.
The last part here I am going to attempt to describe some famous dishes to
Jining. Again this is my old city that I
just left and there is one particular dish that is really only found in Jining
area. The first one can be found in
other areas but common around Jining is called “dofu nao.” Literal translation is tofu brain. So it is a bowl of tofu along with some
vinegar, peanuts, and chili sauce if you want it spicy. It is actual quite simple but a bowl of that
along with something else was a great meal.
The next dish is common in Jining and I ate a lot of it. The name is called ‘baji mo.’ This simply is
a sandwich type food. So pork is boiled
and cooked for a while. Then you take
some of the pork and dice it up fine and put it into a circular type of
bread. Of course you can add peppers to
make it spicy if you want. Some people also have hard boiled eggs that are
cooking with the meat and can be added to the sandwich. Some people claim this
is similar to a hamburger which I guess isn’t that far off. This food could be found all over Jining but
my favorite vendor was because of how crispy he made the bread.
The final dish to be talked about is a dish I have only seen in
Jining. The name of the dish is “bengrou ganfan.” This literally translates
to meat and rice which doesn’t help the description. So essentially it is pork that is in a pot of
both herbs and spices cooking together over a slow fire for hours. What makes this dish so special is that tofu
is wrapped around the meat. It doesn’t
sound that good but trust me it is delicious.
Besides just meat there is also kelp, eggs, spinach, tofu, peppers,
mushrooms, and other things that are cooked in the same process but without
being wrapped in the tofu. When you eat
this sort of food you get a bowl of rice and then simply choose what others you
want to eat and enjoy. This dish feels
you up for a long time and is a hearty dish.
Those have been some of the special dishes to the Shandong cuisine and a
simple overall description of Chinese cuisine.
There was one night a few foreigners and I were out at are favorite
place to eat in Jining when the manager came to talk with us. He did that a lot but this particular night
we were asking him specifically about the different foods in China. This whole
conversation was in Chinese but he went on for a while (close to thirty
minutes) sharing with us just about food.
It was neat to hear from him who has worked in restaurants basically his
whole life. I share that little story
because there is so much more that could be talked about. In the future I will do some more about food
such as the different venues and places to eat.
That will be fun because different sort of dishes are found at different
places. Anyway I hope I didn’t confuse
you too much with throwing in the Chinese (since I order the food with those words it made it easier to remember the different vegetables and dishes) and trying to do the descriptions at
the same time. I have some pictures below with some captions so that should make it easier. I thought I had more pictures than what I actually have but I guess I am always to busy enjoying my food and don't take pictures. I will keep eating (plus try to take more pictures) and trying new foods so
that way I can share later. Well this
writing and especially the pictures has made me hungry. I would tell you to go grab some Chinese food
but just know that it won’t be the same that I will be eating here
shortly. Either way enjoy! I will write later.
 |
| Typically sharing of dishes with our own rice. Even the salad had meat on it! |
 |
| "Garlic, garlic. . . come get your garlic!" |
 |
| A peanut dish that is really good. |
 |
| A sweet dish right next to a salty dish. They love to get different flavors. |
 |
| In the bowl is the dofu nao. The noodles aren't supposed to be inside it is just my old roommate always mixed everything together. |
 |
| 'Baji mo' bread being heated up. |
 |
| 'bengrou ganfan' (not meat but also cooked the same way) |
 |
| 'bengrou ganfan' (meat part that is wrapped in tofu) |
 |
| An assortment of delicious food. |
 |
| Some more delicious food. |
