The art of eating...

Recently we went to a restaurant in the Huairou district, which is a bit north of us, towards the Great Wall.

We went for lunch (around 11:30am in good Chinese fashion) and had some yummy food. Because we were with Chinese friends, we were even introduced to a couple new dishes we had never had before. Hurrah!

The restaurant not only had great food, but it was also a pretty place to visit. Simon and I took lo-o-o-o-o-ots of pictures.


 

Walking in. (Number nine does not seem all that cooperative...)
 

The tables all consisted of four parts, each displaying some kind of item. The big circle on top is the part of the table that will later carry all the food. You turn it around in circles so that everyone can easily get to the food.
 

Ordering food is a breeze, especially when others do it for you :-)
 

Getting ready. Thomas is already swirling the glass top on which they'll later put the food.

So under all the table tops are these kinds of items. This is a close-up of one of them, presumably some white beans. Simon made it a true art project (and in the process killed the battery in my phone). Here's the art gallery:
 

 

 

 

 
 
 

Eventually, some items also appeared on top of the table!

 

This might not be your grandmother's home cooking (unless you are Chinese), but it is delicious.

 

And this is what a good swirl at the dinner table looks like :-)

 

 

In het Nederlands: Een paar weekjes terug waren we in een mooi restaurant een stukje buiten de stad. Het eten was lekker en de vele kleurtjes binnen waren een genot voor het oog. Simon maakte een hele fotoserie van de verschillende voorwerpen die in de bakken onder de tafels lagen. Bovenop de tafels zie je de typisch Chinese draaischijf (deze keer van doorzichtig glas) om de schalen met eten mee rond te draaien zodat iedereen er goed bij kan.

 

 

Chairman Wang Woks my Broc!

About a week ago, all one could think about--at least if you are just a stone's throw or kungfu-arm's length away from Japan--was the devastating earthquake there, the Tsunami, and of course the then-growing emergency at the Fukushima reactor.

So I meant to write about earthquakes--China has it's own share of earthquakes, we happen to live on a (minor, we hope) fault line ourselves, and Paul of course stays in business because of the never-ending series of disasters around the world.

But, I couldn't do it. Somewhere on this computer is floating a draft blog post about earthquakes -- and one day I'll find it again and finish it off. But not today.

So today's blog post is about another kind of earth-shattering experience: A couple friends and I had a delicious dinner at a cooking school and restaurant downtown Beijing. The place is called Black Sesame Kitchen. When you come to Beijing, I'll take you there.

Here are some mouth-watering pictures:

This was the menu for the evening, I kid you not. Pan fried dumplings, fried shitake and coriander (yum, yum, yum!), flash fried lamb and leeks, red braised eggplant, wok-fried string beans, red braised pork belly, garlic broccoli, cashew kungpao chicken, pine nut and beef stirfry, and candied sweet potatoes with ice cream.

These are the chefs, Chairman Wang and Chef Zhang. They are cooking in the kitchen, just steps away from your table.

Pan-fried pumpkin dumplings. The sauce is just a bit of vinegar with chilies. Delicious!

Did you ever have a Chairman steam your broccoli?

Wok-fried string beans.

More steaming broccoli.

Restaurant owner and author Jen Lin-Liu. Originally from California, Jen joined a Beijing cooking school in 2005. After dinner, I immediately bought her book, Serve the People, A Stir-Fried Journey Through China. If only for the sub-title.

Chairman Wang.

The three musketeers.

Oh, the entrance. I just wanted to show you this place is a bit off-the beaten track. Well, not really, as Jen is locally quite famous. But really - maybe they should have turned on at least one light at the gate - it was a bit hard to find.

My method of finding things in Beijing: I took a picture of the pub on the corner, so I can remember where to search for the restaurant's entrance...

Imperial Li- Eating like an emperor

Last week Saturday was a clash of cultures: China vs America. And...I have to say, China won.

First, we ended up accidentally eating imperial food for lunch. Yes, imperial--from the emperor--the kind of food that the Chinese emperor used to eat (before he got ousted from office in 1911).

We were looking for a place for lunch and I knew that one of Thomas' class mates' parents had just opened a new restaurant, so we went to check it out. I thought it would be a pretty casual Chinese restaurant, but after we walked in we quickly realized it was quite fancy. In fact, it was amazing, and I had some of the best food I've ever had.

During the lunch, we learned that the great-great-grandparent of Thomas's class mate really had worked for the emperor, way back when there still was one. Apparently he was the head of the guards and in charge of keeping the emperor safe, which included being in charge of what meals were prepared for the emperor. Apparently, the great-great-grandfather memorized all the recipes and then handed them down to his children. Years later-- after the emperor was gone and even the cultural revolution had washed across China--the grandson (the grandparent of Thomas' class mate) opened up his first restaurant, which later lead to a chain of Family Li Imperial Cuisine restaurants in Shanghai, Beijing, and Tokyo.

So the food was really imperial and certainly tasted like it. We ate from lots of little dishes that wave-by-wave arrived at our table: duck, cooked celery, lotus root, sweet and sour pork, ... delicious.

After lunch we had a quick peek at the photo gallery at the restaurant which showed Mick Jagger, Jackie Chan, and Henry Paulson (a former U.S. Treasury Secretary) visiting. We certainly were in good company! :-)

So that was China. One point for China.

Then later that same Saturday, we delved into American culture. I've lived 10 years in the U.S. and never bothered to make a gingerbread house, so I don't quite know what possessed me to try to make one last week. But our "club house" had organized an event, the kids wanted to go, so we went.

What a disaster! I'd like to blame the materials, the lighting, the table cloth, (something, anything, but me), but I could not put together these gingerbread houses. Any time I glued the roof on, the walls would be collapsing underneath. (You can see in the pictures what these houses are supposed to be like, and what mine looked like.)

Picture: what a gingerbread house is supposed to look like.

It was a "kid activity", but the kids were impatiently waiting for me to somehow build a house, so that they could just glue some candy on top. Well, around me little mansions were being erected, and all I had was 2 sets of 6 loose plates with glue all over them. (The "glue" by the way, was just cake icing, and if you ask me, it did not glue at all.)

At some point, a Chinese man came over to help me with my houses. I think that when a Chinese guy comes over to help you with your gingerbread house, you really are in trouble. The kids, at that point, were already gone, playing somewhere else in the building.

When the second house collapsed, I declared defeat. Among the sympathetic looks of my fellow gingerbread house makers, I picked up the pieces (literally) and walked out. Never again am I building a gingerbread house.

Picture: What my gingerbread houses looked like (foreground).

So that was America: 0
China vs America: 1:0

I vote for more Imperial Li and less gingerbread houses in my future.