liuzhou

Lunch： 辣子鸡 (là zi jī) Chilli Chicken (again). Seem to be out of red chillies. Only green in this. Highly inauthentic. 蛋饺 (dàn jiǎo) Pork Dumplings with Egg Wrappers (also again). 青菜 (qīng cài) Greenery 米饭 (mǐ fàn) Rice Dinner: 清蒸鲫鱼 (qīng zhēng jì yú) Steamed Crucian Carp 青菜 (qīng cài) Greenery 米饭 (mǐ fàn) Rice

35. 玉林菜 (yù lín cài) 玉林 (yù lín), Yulin city, in south-east Guangxi leans heavily towards the Cantonese in its cuisine. It has gained some unfair notoriety thanks to the animal rights movements’ free world-wide publicity for its annual dog meat festival. The dog festival isn’t a dog festival and is of little importance in the city, where most people never eat dog. I have written about this before, so won’t repeat myself. Instead I’ll link to what I wrote, then more usefully mention what Yulin is really famous for. Real 玉林菜 (yù lín cài) – Yulin Food. No. 1 is beef, particularly a type of beef jerky known as 牛巴 (niú bā). This is sold all over China. It comes in packets with a little soy sauce or in a dry version. I prefer the former. 牛巴 (niú bā) - Yulin Sauced Beef Jerky 牛巴 (niú bā) Dry Yulin 牛巴 (niú bā) Whether it comes from regular cattle or water buffalo is not openly discussed, but it is good stuff. Another notable speciality of the city is a unique form of noodle dish. 酸菜鱼 (suān cài yú) is a popular Sichuan dish of local carp in a broth with pickled mustard greens. In Yulin, they have evolved the dish and serve it with rice noodles as the local twist. And it works! Sold in hole-in-the-wall shacks and small restaurants, it is a popular snack, lunch or even breakfast. 玉林酸菜粉 - Yulin Fish Noodles with Pickled Mustard Greens The smaller town of Rongxian near Yulin is the home of 杨贵妃 (yáng guì fēi) (719-756), a noted Tang Dynasty beauty and consort of the Emperor. Her story is here. It is said that her favourite dish was pork braised with 柚子 皮 (yòu zi pí) pomelo skin, pomelo being another local speciality. The skin requires extensive preparation and soaking to make it palatable, but the finished dish is memorable. Dried pomelo skin is available, too. Unfortunately, Ms. Yang came to a sticky end. 柚子 - Pomelo If you don't fancy that, the pomelos (柚子 - yòu zi) are great without the skin!

34. 区域性菜系 (qū yù xìng cài xì) In contrast to their generally adverse attitude to foreign cuisines, the locals have no such compunction about food from other regions of China. Indeed Guangxi cuisine has been based on taking on what it fancies from other 区域性 (qū yù xìng cài) regional cuisine and making it their own. This continues. Funds permitting, I can find grub from all over this large land. From Xinjiang to Shanghai; from Yunnan to Heilongjiang. There are restaurant in Liuzhou from almost everywhere (Tibet is the obvious exception). Most hotel restaurants are Cantonese, catering to the business people coming in from Hong Kong, but there are a few very expensive Cantonese independents. 金河軒 Cantonese Restaurant I seldom trouble them. Overpriced and under-flavoured, if you ask me. That said, there is one chain place, Kong Oh! in their version of English, that is just OK and not crazily priced. Their roast goose is good. Sichuan is well represented, with the locals drawn by the spicy experience, so I’m not short of my mapo doufu fix. I have to mention in passing a long gone Sichuan place that had really good food. They also had a bizarre gimmick. Bald waitresses! One follicley challenged young lady told me that the waitresses received a handsome increase in renumeration if they shaved their heads. She also said she wore a wig when not at work, but wasn't worried as her hair would always grow back. Hunan, too is represented. For years, the main Hunan restaurant was a bit of a dump with great food. The biggest problem was the huge portraits of Mao, a Hunan native, covering its walls. A few years ago it relocated across the road to a more upmarket venue and in the process, Mao got dumped. 韶山 (sháoshān) - Shaoshan was Mao''s hometown in Hunan. The restaurant is named after the town Shanghai gets a look in for its soup dumplings. That's all this small restaurant does. 才哥汤包馆 - Caige Soup Dumpling Shop And from the best food city in China we have a great Xi'an restarant. 西安好吃管 - Xi'an Good Taste Food North-west China is well represented with Xinjiang Muslim food as is Lanzhou, home of hand-pulled noodles. We also have good Xi’an cooking. Saieid Muslim Restaurant (from Xinjiang) 兰州拉面 (lán zhōu lā miàn) - Lanzhou Hand-Pulled Noodles from Gansu Province Even Heilongjiang province in the frozen far north-east bordering Siberia gets a look-in with its great dumpling (and more) restaurant, Harbin Jiaozi King. 哈尔滨饺子王 (hā ěr bīn jiǎo zi wáng) - Harbin Jiaozi King But at the end of the day, the locals like their familiar comfort foods and head to places like this specialising in Liuzhou and Guilin dishes. Liu-Gui Restaurant or even better, a bowl of noodles while perched on a plastic stool in the street.

There are large numbers of foreigners working in the major cities such as Beijing, Shanghai etc (or were pre-Covid), but they are essentially unstable enclaves. People come on short-term work contracts and maybe stay a year or two at most. China has never encouraged immigration. I am very unusual - in more ways than one. The only exception I can think of is the approx 2 milion population of ethnic Koreans mainly in Jilin province, bordering N. Korea, but they've been there for hundreds of years. It doesn't really compare. Liuzhou has very few foreigners, mostly Asian and most of those are students, so not prime users of restaurants. There is no cohesive community of foreigners. I only really know two foreigners in town - one American with a Chinese wife, and a German woman. I rarely see either of them. To survive, any restaurant must appeal to the locals, not the handful of foreigners, and the locals just aren't that interested unless it's American fast food.

33. 外国食品 (wài guó shí pǐn) I’ve long thought that a nation’s cuisine is defined in part by what they don’t eat, as much as by what they do. Despite sharing a border with Vietnam, very little Vietnamese cuisine (my favourite) makes its way across. Loads of fruit is imported, but not the cuisine. Generally, 外国食品 (wài guó shí pǐn), foreign food, is hard to find – even from our nearest neighbour. However, I’m convinced quite a lot has made the journey in the other direction. A couple of pseudo-Vietnamese places opened a while back around town, they all only did one dish – the same one dish. That was bánh cuốn, the Vietnamese rice noodle rolls with minced pork, fish sauce, vegetables and herbs etc. Some of my more adventurous acquaintances visited some of these places and were very disappointed. Bánh Cuốn - Liuzhou “It’s just Mandarin: 肠粉 (cháng fěn) / Cantonese: 腸粉 (cheung fun), with stuff on it” they complained in their language of choice. It turned out that all of these places were Chinese owned, but the proprietors thought to apply some added value by pretending to be Vietnamese. They have all gone. In the short lived 越南螃蟹腿 (yuè nán páng xiè tuǐ) - Vietnam Crab Leg restaurant, the crab legs may have been Vietnamese; the management and chefs weren’t. And not one of these “Vietnamese” places ever offered me phở or bánh xèo! 越南螃蟹腿 (yuè nán páng xiè tuǐ) - Vietnam Crab Leg However, it is reasonably certain that 腸粉 (cheung fun) was taken into Vietnam by the Chinese and slowly Vietnamized. It is, after all, virtually the same apart from the condiments and garnishes. This type of Chinese owned and run ‘foreign’ food place is something I have experienced before. One Thai restaurant in town only ever sold Chinese food, but with half a lime on top of each dish! There wasn’t a Thai in the building. That said, we have had a couple of good Thai restaurants, but again they didn’t last long. The Malaysian restaurant didn’t last 6 months. Japanese came and went. Korean the same. Despite their noted tendency to eat everything, in fact, many Chinese diners are very conservative and very nationalistic. Or they try once and move on. The Italian restaurant in the Radisson Blu hotel with a real Italian chef didn’t last. Too different and wildly expensive. People just wanted noodles and thought risotto was an abomination. The one time I went, a mid-week lunch time, my companion and I were the only customers. One French-ish place, not the first, clings on. Only the foreign fast food places seem to last – unfortunately. I might have to open a fish and chip shop. Huangji Vietnam Noodle Rolls (Bánh Cuốn) - Liuzhou

@KennethT I just measured my breakfast baozi - 10cm / 4 inches. It is similar to those I photographed for the Guangxi Gastronomy topic. Why I happen to have a tape measure in hospital, I'll leave to the mists of obscurity. Now the nurses are giving me strange looks.

There is no definitive recipe as such. It does tend to be a 'fridge clearing' dish, but this version was just mean. I would normally expect to find some lean pork slivers, some vegetable other than onion*, maybe carrot slivers or Chinese black fungus and certainly not just one bean sprout. The over-cooked egg is just bizarre. I've never been served anything like it. Cheapest protein, I suppose. And it would be seasoned with soy sauce. *Someone in that kitchen loves onions. They turn up in everything. They aren't that common in everyday cooking.

It's definitely tastier than the medicine.

No. Bigger. Nearer to 4 inch. Ah! Well, yes. Again different places tend to go for a similar look. All the baozi in Shanghai look similar but different from HK. No, I've seen char siu in large cubes and small dice and even minced in baozi.

I'm confused as to how you know what size the baozi are when there's nothing in the pictures to give any scale. Anyway, baozi come in all sorts of sizes depending on the vendor. The ones in the images were average to large. Different places have different protocols for marking or snipping baozi. The most common is some sort of code so that the vendor knows the filling just by looking at the bun. The menu lists shiitake and diced pork buns. The dice in those is within the parameters you mention. Personally, I prefer a smaller cut in my baozi. Or ground/minced pork.

After my breakfast disappointment, dinner eventually rolled around the kitchen redeemed itself. 子姜炒鸭 (zǐ jiāng chǎo yā) - Stir-Fried Duck with New Crop Ginger. Served with Rice.

32. 包子 (bāo zi) I've mentioned 包子 (bāo zi) a few times recenty in different topics, but never really thought much about what is available here in Guangxi. I tend to stick to the same two or three choices. But there are many more. So, I checked out a very popular local place (the one all the taxidrivers use) and translated their on-the-wall menu. Many of the items are duplicated, appearing on both the top banner and down the right hand side. I've only included each one once. I can't pretend to know what they all really are. Quicksand Bun, anyone? Char Siu bun Pork and Shiitake Bun Sesame and Peanut Bun 小笼包 xiǎo lóng bāo Xiaolongbao 鲜肉蒸饺 xiān ròu zhēng jiǎo Fresh Pork Steamed Jiaozi 糯米烧卖 nuò mǐ shāo mài Glutinous Rice Shaomai 玫瑰豆沙包 méi guī dòu shā bāo Rose Bean Paste Bun 嘉华莲蓉包 jiā huá lián róng bāo Jiahua Lotus Seed Bun 芝麻花生包 zhī ma huā shēng bāo Sesame Peanut Bun 韭菜鸡蛋包 jiǔ cài jī dàn bāo Garlic Chive Egg Bun 香油素菜包 xiāng yóu sù cài bāo Sesame Oil Vegetable Bun 红烧粉丝包 hóng shāo fěn sī bāo Red Cooked Vermicelli Bun 麻辣酱肉包 má là jiàng ròu bāo Hot and Numbing Paste Pork Bun 香菇肉丁包 xiāng gū ròu dīng bāo Shiitake and Diced Pork Bun 腌菜肉丝包 yān cài ròu sī bāo Salt vegetable Pork Bun 鲜肉灌汤包 xiān ròu guàn tāng bāo Fresh Pork Soup Dumpling 玖瑰豆沙包 jiǔ guī dòu shā bāo Black Jade Bean Paste Bun 珍珠烧卖 zhēn zhū shāo mài Pearl Shao Mai 叉烧包 chā shāo bāo Char Siu Bun 牛肉包 niú ròu bāo Beef Bun 水晶包 shuǐ jīng bāo Crystal Bun 流沙包 liú shā bāo Quicksand Bun 自制豆沙包 zì zhì dòu shā bāo Self-Made Bean Paste Bun 大馒头 dà mán tou Large Unstuffed Steamed Bread (Mantou)

This breakfast was disappointing. Advertised simply as 炒粉 (chǎo fěn) fried rice noodles, it came with overscrambled eggs and was totaly unseasoned. With onion and one miserable bean sprout. Fortunately, I had also ordered a couple of pork baozi as back-up (not pictured).

31. 武鸣柠檬鸭 (wǔ míng níng méng yā) Wuming Lemon Duck This one I take personally. I’ve written about it here before, so I’ll just summarise. 武鸣 (wǔ míng), Wuming is a town south of Nanning city, Guangxi’s capital. It is very much a Zhuang stronghold and is considered to be the source of the southern dialect of the Zhuang dialect. At some time in the 1980s, a local speciality was born. Precisely who was responsible is open to debate (I suspect it just evolved and there is no one inventor) but it is certainly clear who popularised it. One of my closest friends is from Nanning, but her maternal family home is Wuming. In high school, she had a classmate, also originally from Wuming, whose grandfather had a tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurant in Nanning. Early on, his daughter, classmate’s mother introduced the dish to the restaurant and it became widely popular. Now that hole-in-the-wall is a hugely successful chain with several branches in Nanning and beyond. There is a branch here in Liuzhou. Not a Hole-in-the-Wall. They've got their own walls now. Several of them. I first tasted the dish in 2008 in their flagship restaurant when the classmate hosted my friend and I along with a couple of other friends. Details of that meal are here. The dish, 武鸣柠檬鸭 (wǔ míng níng méng yā), Wuming Lemon Duck, consists of stir fried duck with preserved lemon and spices. The lemons can take years to reach perfection in their eyes. I have a couple at home which are now 25 years old! Just about ready, I guess! There is a recipe for making the lemons written by my friend here Zhuang Preserved Lemons Finally, there is a recipe for the finished dish, wrested from the restaurant by guile, deceit and fraud. The internet now has a few recipes, too. I’ve just spent the morning reading them. They are all garbage. One even insists on Peppadews, as if Nanning is in South Africa! Idiots.

Neither are sweet. The green are mildly spicy (by my standards) although occasionally one can creep up on you; the red are fiery spicy (as I like). The dish would be considered rather spicy by most people, I think, but not so much the locals. We like spicy round these parts. I guess I'm going to be here till the end of the week or early next depending on how well my ancient body responds to treatment. It is working, but it is slow. Thanks.

30. 酸嘢 (suān yě) Mixed Pickles Don’t go looking for 酸嘢 (suān yě) in a dictionary; you won’t find it. It is from an undocumented Guangxi dialect and like Guangxi cuisine is a hybrid. The first part 酸 (suān), comes from Mandarin and here means ‘acid’, ‘sour’, ‘tart’ or ‘pickled’. The second 嘢 (yě) is Cantonese and means ‘things’, so together we have ‘pickled things’ or just ‘pickles’. Internet travel guides tell you these are a speciality of Guangxi’s capital, Nanning and while that’s not exactly untrue, they are in fact popular across the whole area. All the pictures in this post were taken here in Liuzhou, for example. I’ve already mentioned pickled meats and fish but 酸嘢 (suān yě) is used to refer to pickled vegetables and fruits. These are sold everywhere by itinerant merchants to supermarket chains. The roadside guys and gals are the most popular and everyone has their favourite. Itinerant Pickled Salesman The pickles are even served as an appetizer at wedding banquets. Wedding Pickle Jar Wedding Pickles So what vegetables and fruit are pickled? What do you fancy? Almost everything can be pickled. The veg or fruit is soaked in rice wine with sugar and chilli pepper to give a sweet, sour and spicy result. Everywhere, you can see people snacking on these delicacies. So, to illustrate (literally) I’m just going to post images of examples of 酸嘢 (suān yě). I will identify most of those I know, but many are a mystery. They often don’t look like they did, once they’ve been processed Pickled Selection Pickled Selection ( I can see figs and daikon radish) Bottom right is pickled cucumbers Supermarket Selection Pickled Cowpeas Pickled Garlic Shoot Bulbs Pickled Peanuts with Green Chilli Pickled Daikon Radish Pickled Long Beans Pickled Lotuus Root Pickled Chillies Neither vegetable or fruit, but algae - Pickled Kelp Pickled Chicken Skin Fruit Soy Pickled Garlic Pickled Mustard Greens To my surprise, I don't seem to have a picture of my favourites - pickled mango or papaya. Later!

They aren't mosquitoes. There are no mosquitoes in Scotland. They are midges, for which Scotland is notorious. https://www.visitscotland.com/travel-planning/midges-ticks-scotland

Dinner： 黄鳝粥 (huáng shàn zhōu) - Paddy Eel Congee 青椒牛肉 (qīng jiāo niú ròu) - Green Chili Beef (except it had more red, my preference anyway)

They have fences now? Modern life!!

As someone who grew up spending a lot of time on an uncle's farm, I feel obliged to point out that although the Highland Cattle may look cute and photogenic, they can be bad-tempered and aggressive. I have the scars to prove it.

29.食油 (shí yóu) In some people’s minds, Chinese food is too oily or greasy. I suggest they have never had real Chinese food. Yes, some parts of China favour a more oily preparation – Shanghai for example but I don’t find it excessively so. Other areas are far from greasy. The Chinese are generally unafraid of animal fats, it’s true. The famous Hangzhou dish, 东坡肉 (dōng pō ròu), Dongpo Pork is made from from pork belly that is nearly all fat. However, when well made, it isn’t greasy at all. The fat is meltingly soft and packed with flavour. 东坡肉 (dōng pō ròu) - Dongpo Pork The pork of choice is almost always 五花肉 (wǔ huā ròu) - literally ‘five flower meat’ so named because five layers are visible – two pairs of fat and flesh and finally the skin. 五花肉 (wǔ huā ròu) - Five Flower Pork Belly Even when buying say a piece of pork tenderloin for a lean meat stir fry, it will come with fat. This will be removed and cut into pieces then rendered out to be used to stir-fry the dish and any accompanying vegetables etc. The veg do not pick up any porcine flavours. I have only once seen lard (pig fat) in a supermarket – everyone renders their own. 猪里脊肉 (zhū lǐ ji ròu) - Pork Tenderloin High quality leaf lard (猪板油 - zhū bǎn yóu) from the kidneys is available on-line at reasonable prices of around $2 USD for 500 grams, just over 1 lb. 猪板油 (zhū bǎn yóu) - Leaf Lard* Besides pig fat, various vegetable cooking oils are used. The generic term is 食油 (shí yóu), literally ‘food oil’. The preferred choice is very regional. Although my local stores all carry 大豆油 (dà dòu yóu) soy oil, 葵花油 (kuí huā yóu) sunflower oil, 菜油 (cài yóu) rapeseed oil/canola,, 玉米油 (yù mǐ yóu) cØrn oil and 植物油 (zhí wù yóu) blended anonymous ‘vegetable’ oil, by far the favourite locally is 花生油 (huā shēng yóu) peanut oil. Other areas differ. 化身有 (huā shēng yóu) - Peanut Oil* I differ, too. I prefer the neutral taste and high smoke point of 稻米油 (dào mǐ yóu), aka 米糠油 (mǐ kāng yóu), which is rice bran oil. 稻米油 (dào mǐ yóu) - Rice Bran Oil 橄榄油 (gǎn lǎn yóu), imported olive oil has become available in recent years. I was so excited I took my first selfie holding a bottle just to show friends who had left China appalled at the previous lack of the Mediterranean delight. Unfortunately, what is available is generally of very low quality and is mainly used as a cosmetic by my lady friends. Chinese food never uses it! 橄榄油 (gǎn lǎn yóu) I should also mention 麻油 (má yóu) / 香油 (xiāng yóu) / 芝麻油 (zhī ma yóu), three names for the same thing - sesame oil. This refers to toasted sesame oil and is only ever used as a finishing oil, off the heat, immediately applied to a dish before serving. It is never used for cooking or marinating. It is valued for its scent and favour, both of which are highly volatile and rapidly lost when heated. 芝麻油 (zhī ma yóu) - Toasted Sesame Oil There was a scandal a few years back when some unscrupulous turds were collecting used cooking oil from restaurants and canteens etc, “purifying” it and selling it back to the same restaurants etc as being new. This trade in what is known as 地沟油 (dì gōu yóu) or gutter oil was stamped upon from a great height and people imprisoned for lengthy times and is now thankfully extremely rare. 加油 (jiā yóu), literally ‘add oil’ is yelled at players by sports fans and is the equivalent of ‘Go Go! Go!’ or whatever you shout to encourage your team or favourite sporting star. * Marked images from advertisements on Meituan shopping portal - fair use, but I will replace

What @Anna N says. The peas are sold in cans or dried in bags or boxes. I have never used canned - they didn't have them when I lived in the UK, so far as I remember. When I was in the UK last, I bought these. They are still in my cupboard. They last forever. I won't!

Skye is beautiful and I want to live in the Oyster Shed. Haven't been for too long.

Yes, Indeed. Never fresh peas. Unheard of. Almost sacrilegious. An insult to the finest salmon and to fish and chips.

In addition to the egg and tomato, the egg and cucumber and the egg and bitter melon, they also offer egg and green beans and egg and green chilli.