Have You Eaten?

Asking someone "Have you eaten?" is common greeting in Chinese, especially during mealtimes. It's not an invitation for a free meal, but it's meant to show the asker's concern. I have eaten a lot of wonderful food here.

We eat lunch here at the foster home, but are on our own for breakfasts and dinners. For lunch we usually have rice (of course) and two or three dishes (like scrambled egg and tomato, Chinese cabbage and tofu, or beef and potatoes). Sometimes we have cold, spicy noodles or dumplings.  For dinner, Meilina and I have leftovers, go to the small family-owned restaurants around the block (2 people can eat very well for about 4 US dollars), or boil some ramen noodles. The Muslim market downtown and the main road through our village here both have an abundance of street vendors. The moral is: we have eaten, and we've eaten well.  

Here's some of my favorite Chinese food from the past month.

1.       Beef and Pulled Noodles 牛肉拉面

Absolutely delicious. Fresh, hand-pulled noodles in broth with veggies and beef.

 

2.       Yang Rou Pao Mo羊肉泡馍

To be honest, this dish wasn't really one of my favorites, but I had to mention it because it's a specialty of Xi'an. Pao mo consists of crumbs of unleaved bread soaked in lamb broth and served with lamb meat. The bread tasted like soggy stuffing, but the meat was flavored deliciously. I ate it, but I haven't ordered it again.

 

3.       Dumplings 水饺

Probably my favorite thing to eat here. My favorite filling is pork and cabbage, but the cook here at Starfish also makes really good vegetarian dumplings. In Zhenjiang (the city outside of Nanjing where I taught English 3 years ago), dumplings were always served with vinegar. Here, they're served with a spicy, garlicky sauce that I love.

4.       Potstickers （锅贴）

Fried dumplings. A classic example of Chinese street food.

5.       Baozi 包子

Steamed buns, filled with pork.

Meilina and I really like street food. Some of our other favorites are quail eggs on a stick, fried persimmon cakes, and ice cream bars for less than 50 cents. This guy sells meat on a stick in our village.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

By the way, I found this interesting article.