liuzhou

I am in mourning. Minor mourning. Not all-out grief. About once a year at most, I take a notion for pizza. As you know my choices are limited, but there in one place very near me that did one reasonable example of something a passing Italian might recognise. This is a black truffle and Parma ham pizza. The truffles are Chinese, so worthless, but the ham seems real and the base and cheese reasonable. The pizza comes with rocket / arugula for you to apply yourself. Of course the real deal looks little like the image they use in their delivery listing. I wasn’t particularly looking to but one a few days ago, but was idly going through the delivery app, when I noticed something odd. This is their online listing. That black bar at the bottom means the store is closed. This was prime time Friday evening. Most odd. Since then I have checked it every day and it’s still closed, suggesting it’s gone for good. Damn!

From the ridiculous to the sublime. My favourite mooncakes. 冰皮榴莲月饼 (bīng pí liú lián yuè bǐng), literally ice skin durian fruit cakes. These are the only ones I’d lay out my own ill-gotten gains to acquire.

To my horror, one local (not very good) bakery chain is disgracefully selling innocent people the execrable Luosifen mooncakes again. However they are faking their advertising. The Chinese character on the cake's top, 螺 is that for the luo part of luosifen, but the image of the cut cake is something else entirely. The real cake interior looks like this: Foul.

Last night. Shepherd's Pie. I forgot to take a photograph, so this is one I made earlier - looks exactly the same.

The depths of despair. Bacon, cØrn and "cheese".

The reason I was surprised by the pork mooncake above wasn't that it was meat; more that it was just meat. Meat in mooncakes is not unusual. But usually with other ingredients making up the bulk.. This here is either a ham or char siu (Mandarin, 叉烧 (chā shāo)) and mixed nuts mooncake. I'm not sure which as they do both and they look the same. Mixed nuts is clearly the trend for this year.

Never heard of them. Where are you watching this?

I'm not sure what's going on here and even less sure I want to find out. This is presented as a 肉月饼 (ròu yuè bǐng), literally meat mooncake, but as always in China 'meat' without a specific identification is pork., so pork mooncake. I won't be trying it.

This time, 白莲藕蛋月饼 (bái lián ǒu dàn yuè bǐng), a traditional mooncake with a twist, White Lotus Root with Salted Egg Mooncake.

@Smithy is one of two mineral compounds: nephrite or jadeite, the latter being the purest and most valued. It comes in various colours. For some reason these mooncakes were described with the Chinese term for jadeite; not that for jade. I haven't tasted them - as yet, but guess they are made of sweet green beans. I'll let you know.

金翡翠月饼 (jīn fěi cuì yuè bǐng), Golden Jadeite Mooncake

I wasn't trained in a sino-centric anything. What confused me was not mistranslating kanji (Characters derived from Chinese, but often having different meanings in the two languages) or Japanese invented kanji characters but rather that they used kanji at all. I more often see koji in hiragana (こうじ), so that what was looking for. And, in addition, the kanji is more usually 麹. Anyway, I apologise for any confusion or misdirection caused. Moving on, we still don’t know why it is so sweet.

They are everywhere. My nearest is just across the road and there are two others nearby. They are open 7 days a week. The idea of a weekly shop is unthinkable to the Chinese mind. They demand absolute freshness.

The 2012 eG topic is here.

牛肉豆芽炒粉 (niú ròu dòu yá chǎo fěn), beef and beansprout fried rice noodles. Nicely spicy。

I honestly don't know. I can read every word and none say it's koji. Sorry

Bizarre. I can't work out what that is. It mentions shio (salt) but I cant see the word koji anywhere on the container. It does however say it's for grilled food, simmered food, Japanese food, stir fried food. Sorry.

There is certainly a sweet koji (甘い麹 - amai koji). It does not contain sugar but the sweetness comes from the processing of the rice turning the starch into glucose. Maybe that's what you accidentally bought.

And there lies a major difference. Most people here shop for vegetables daily and never trouble their fridges. (Anyway, there would be no difficulty in cutting it into sections to refrigerate.)

五仁月饼 (wǔ rén yuè bǐng), five nut mooncake. This one, I would eat.

I was in the market today and looked for the largest Welsh onion I could find. That involved examining around 20 vegetable stalls. The longest was this one at 66 cm / 2 foot, 2 inches. Cost me the equivalent of 27 cents US.

No direct experience of using it but certainly of consuming it. Shio (しお or 塩) means salt in Japanese. Koji (こうじ or 麹) can be rice, barley or soy beans infected with Aspergillus oryzae. Put the two together and you have shio koji which is indeed used as a tenderiser. It is a paste made from a mixture of rice koji, salt and water. It breaks down protein and starches. It also adds umami to dishes.

Does anyone have any experience with this brand. I've been burned before and am suspicious of the relatively low pricing.

Yes. I can eat them, but wouldn't miss them. No. I don't see them as particularly outlandish, just unusual. I pass because I don't really like the texture of sticky rice. No. They tend to vary every year but nothing to do with the Chinese zodiac years.

October 6th this year sees China’s Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival. This is when people give gifts of mooncakes and traditionally eat them. So, already the stores are stocking up. Every year brings more and more types, from the more traditional to the outlandish. My plan is to post some of the most unusual I see this year. I start with 桑葚米月饼 (sāng shèn mǐ yuè bǐng), black mulberry and sticky rice. I’ll pass.