In one of the most delicious weeks to date, we were taken out again Friday night to an amazing, high-brow Sichuan restaurant. For these communal meals (I like to call them Lazy Susan Sessions), it’s all about the ordering, and our host did an incredible job. Usually, alongside the delicious dishes there are plenty we try to avoid – like tripe cooked every which way, or gelatinous blood with vegetables, or the disconcerting way that they serve small birds with their heads completely on – but this guy kept it palatable, but diverse. We ate everything, although it did feel weird to try roast dove. Kind of like we were eating peace. The most memorable, unusual dish, deserving in itself of a blog post, was the his + hers course – a unique concept because to some it would seem quite sexist for a waiter to present two very different looking plates to the men and women of the table. But I seriously lucked out in being a chick last night:
This is a double boiled papaya, with a jellied fungus soup. It took me 20 minutes and almost half the papaya to figure out that it was in fact, a papaya. Google informs me it is not a typical Sichuan dish, though jellied fungus soup is quite common in most places. It’s supposedly very good for the woman’s Shenti (health) and Jenny told me it makes you beautiful. I told her in that case I would eat one every day because they are so delicious, but she balked at the suggestion and said “NO! It only makes you beautiful if you have it twice a year!” (But according to her I should also cut out cold beverages entirely if I ever plan to have a child. I could write a book on the bizarre Chinese rules of eating and drinking). The soup was served with honey and coconut milk to pour inside – combined with the soft fleshy papaya and sweet broth of the jellied fungus, it was absolutely delicious, and unlike anything I’ve ever had before. It wasn’t overly sweet, and the boiling of the papaya altered its taste beyond recognition- at first I thought it was some relative of a sweet potato or yam, without the heavy starchiness. As a side note, Jenny also informed me that each papaya ran at about 300 kuai ($45), a price that would seem steep even in America. So I guess I can’t get used to it. I really lucked out with this delicacy – to my left Jeff had to dutifully suck down the man’s dish: a slimy, gelatinous Sea Cucumber covered in tentacles , in a murky brown sauce. It was only delicately implied that its suggestive form was good for a man’s … well, if Jenny didn’t spell it out for me, I certainly won’t spell it out for you.
i call this chinese baklava
dumplings dumplings dumplings
what remained of tender, juicy ribs.
spicy rabbit with melon
