liuzhou

The first of three. Juicily messy.

Hunan uses Sichuan peppercorns, too. As does far away Xinjiang. But admittely not as much as Sichuan does. That said, I've never has any bad experiences next day from Sichuan food. Or Hunan.

Not in Sichuan! Anyway, western Hunan is much spicier. The natives there consider the Sichuanese to be utter chilli wimps!

I haven't felt so great the last couple of days. Nothing serious. Old age, I guess. Anyway, tonight I did cook. It's a breaded chicken breast (half shown here) with potato salad (even made the mayo) and tomatoes. I'm not sure why but my usual breadcrumb and spice mix came out blacker than it should, yet I've done it thousands of times before. It wasn't burnt, just too dark in colour but tasted normal. The second half followed minutes later.

You "think" and "someone said" is strong evidence of absolutely nothing.

Last night I ate dinner so late it was closer to breakfast. The light was strange so excuse picture quality. Stir fried pork with mixed wild mushrooms.

Then again, there is clear evidence that it may, in fact, be Vietnamese!

Of course, in Of course, while it was originally a simple peasant dish, there were renowned Messy Potatoan chefs who carefully selected their dung to suit different tastes, clients and seasons. Sheep dung was considered low grade; cattle dung hardly better. Camel dung was too expensive for the common man, but prized by the aristocracy, such as it was. However, as only revealed centuries later, in the Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch Chronicles, the prime ingredient for royalty was pork dung (from pigs fed only virgin girl's blood) mixed with seaweed and sawdust. This was known in Welsh as "hyfrydwch tail moch", later mistranslated into Xhosa as "iihagu zehagu' then retranslated into English as "pork hocks". Hence all the confusion.

Chicken with Chinese Foldwing (羊肝菜) Salad. Chicken cooked 1-10-10, then finished with Shichimi Togarishi.

Baise (百色) is a small city in the far west of Guangxi on the border with Yunnan. The area is famous for two things. It was here that, in 1929, Deng Xiao Ping led the Baise Uprising, a key event in the early stages of the Chinese Communist revolution. More important is that the area is famous for its excellent mangoes. I have a couple of friends who live there. They don't know each other. This afternoon, I was doing not very much at home and my cell phone rang. "Delivery for you! I'm leaving it with the gatekeeper. Please collect it." I'm an obedient sort of chap, so down I went. Sure enough, a box of Baise mangoes from one of my friends. The delivery note told me which friend was responsible. They need a couple of days to fully ripen, but thanks 井荣。

Linguine with pesto and clams.

Garlicky shrimp with chilli, flying fish roe and seagrass over orzo.

Not necessarily. But the origin is the same and that was your question. I don't know where you get this idea that everything originates in just one place. Many things have been discovered or invented over and over again in different places.

Maybe, but it is the origin. And BBQ exists on pretty much every continent. I'm not sure how much in Antartica!

What? People have been cooking meat (and vegetables) over open fires since at least neolithic times. Everywhere! It's how cooking began. I really don't understand your obsession with pinning down where everything began!

Half my dinner. The other half was identical. Fish 'n Chips with a spicy beer batter.

The wraps I ate last night could have just as easily been wrapped in lettuce leaves. Bánh xèo is also often wrapped in lettuce or other leaves rather than the rice paper used here.

I traded a modest amount of my hard-earned for a large duck leg, which I then de-skinned and de-fatted*, then slow braised with garlic, shallots, Sichuan peppers, dried tangerine peel, ginger, dried red chillies and star anise.The duck was removed from braising liquid and left to cool. Later shredded it and loaded into these simple, thin wheaten wraps (approx 8" in diameter) with cucumber and garlic scapes. Dressed with Sriracha (although sour plum sauce would have been good, too - I was out of that. Several were eaten. As it is finger food, here is a finger. Mine. * Fear not! Fat and skin were rendered and added to the duck fat store. I'm not the sort to look a gift duck in the beak!

How could I have forgotten Zhao Tianyu's wonderful "Deadly Delicious"?

Dried 白条鱼 (bái tiáo yú) - sharpbelly, fried and sprinkled with shichimi togarishi. The largest one in the plate was 3½ inches long. Like whitebait - a bit.

Fresh rice noodles in a spicy broth with beef and tonkin jasmine - 夜香花 (yè xiāng huā)

They are small, yes. Everyone uses toothpicks to get the meat out, then sucks out the juices. Slow eating, but so good!

Wild shrimp with lentils in a mild curry sauce with rice and edamame.

Local river snails fried with pickled chilli and pickled bamboo shoot. This dish is a local specialty.

What mushrooms did you use?