Yes, it’s been a while since my first China post – but some things just take their time.

My topic for today is a yummy one: nutrition. You think you know everything about Chinese food because there is this take-away place just around the corner, the happy Chinaman, who serves this fast and delicious glass noodles with chicken and veggies that are your reliable soul food. Think again. Chinese food is full of surprises for the ill-prepared. Some thoughts on this:

Starving within abundance – the snack market

To have some provisions for our day hikes, we stocked up in the local supermarket. Those are very tidy places, with neatly assorted packages of snacks and food. But for the German hiker, craving for hearty bread with cheese or sausage, the range of items caused a dilemma. We had the choice between 100 different cakes, cookies, chocolate bars or other sweets on one side, and then some VERY hearty bits and pieces – which was, bits and pieces of a chicken for instance, namely the feet, the neck and other unmentionables. Thanks god for apples and bananas.

The test market, but still too early to test

Some background information before we start with this one. When asked about typical characteristics of Germans, our guide stated: They are stubborn and inflexible.
So, let’s start the story.
When browsing the cookie aisle, I was wondering about the abundance of Oreo flavors. There was vanilla and double vanilla – still the same boring stuff like at home. But then, there was vanilla mousse, caramel, some sort of kids surprise with colorful sugary sprinkles, chocolate, double chocolate, chocolate mousse, and of course strawberry and… you get the picture. As a vanilla lover and a mousse dessert lover, I choose vanilla mousse, of course I did. At the cash register, the lady tried to scan my cookie package, looked at her screen, tried to scan it again, and then looked at me, shook her head, and put my cookie package away. I was puzzled. No cookies? But I wanted it sooo badly.
So, I tried to figure out what was wrong with my choice. It turned out, that China is a test market for new flavors (not sure whether for Oreos only or for other stuff too), so they had all the new flavors in stock. But the one I choose, was just too new, and hence not even registered in their system.
I was a hungry lion meanwhile, hence I negotiated. Hard. They refused to sell the cookies to me. I begged. Still a no. I insisted that when they offer it to me, I want to buy it.
Finally, they accepted my offer to let me pay for another flavor instead, but still take the vanilla mousse.
Later, cookies in hand, I reflected on our guide’s statement w.r.t. the Germans’ stubbornness. Maybe he was right. But the inflexibility… Not so sure whether it isn’t rather the Chinese who can claim this quality for themselves.

Experiments with mandatory nutrition

On a hot summer day, ice cream is for sure a staple. And in China, you are in experimenter’s heaven. Not only do you have all kinds of fruits and the compulsory vanilla – chocolate – nuts, but you have some surprises as well.
Let’s start with me proving to be a coward, finally. You might have heard about durian, a famous fruit big as a water melon with a bumpy-spiky green-ish outer skin. Inside, it has juicy compartments said to be sooo tasty. That sounds good so far. Now the downside: In Singapore, it is forbidden to carry such a fruit in the underground trains as it stinks like hell and makes yourself sick from the smell. If there is a durian in the train, everybody will know.
I thought that THIS is my chance to finally try a durian, even if in an ice cream popsicle only. Hey, what can go wrong with ice cream? Um… well… everything can go wrong. From my high expectations, I fell very deep when I opened the package, only to try and throw it away in an instant. I just could not bear to lick the stinky feet of a rhino – because this is what it tastes like.
(And no – I never licked rhino feet before, but I know that they can not taste worse.

Always expect the unexpected

A short word on breakfast. I know that I’m lacking flexibility, yes, I confess. But is it my fault that I have some difficulties actually liking Chinese breakfast? I tried, but with limited success. At least, I picked and chose some things from the buffet in the hotel.
One day, breakfast was “they come and bring you something”, which left me in despair because I expected some typical Chinese stuff which I not particularly liked. So I hoped for some bread to go with it at least. And then the surprise: We got the loveliest pancakes I had eaten in a long time, with apples and butter and cocoa and bananas. Soooo yummmmyyy.


(before)


(after)

How can you know that they taste like peanuts?

We visited a silk factory where they showed us how silk is produced, from the hatching silkworm to the finished luxurious duvet. It is a very interesting process, indeed. The sad part is that the silkworm dies in the process – the cocoon is cooked at some point in time, leaving it’s inhabitant (and creator) dead inside. Very sad. And such a waste…
But we were told that the corpses are used for animal food. And actually, they taste like peanuts. Uhgh, but how can you know…???

(advantages of silk stuffing)

Germans like beer. Chinese like schnapps, real schnapps

Haha, yes, they like tea as well. All sorts of tea, green tea, herbal tea, flower tea, wheat tea. Tea wherever you go. We tried the beer, too. It was not too bad. And there is wine, red wine named “The great wall”. Drinkable. Not comparable to a good French vine, but drinkable without too much headache. But the best stuff is sold along the motor way. In an little shop, I spottet a little hip flask with 68% liquor in it, which I bought as a souvenir. When I was about to leave the shop, I looked back to the shelf where I had gotten my flask from and detected it – THE GIANT HIP FLASK, the god of all hip flasks. I could not bring myself to buying it, though.

Ok, that’s it. Enjoy your next Chinese meal from the happy china man around the corner, and do not think of stinky rhino feet.