HAVE YOU EATEN YET?

No one has ever accused Shantou of being clean, beautiful, or well-maintained. The few tourists we do get come here strictly for the beef balls and traditional snacks in the Old City. So on a visit to Xiamen, a city with the same amenities as Shantou—waterfront location, old colonial-era buildings, both economic opportunity zones—we were stuck by what could have been. Clean streets constantly patrolled by garbage men. Charming colonial buildings converted to shops and restaurants. Parks. Public art. Cab drivers who use the meters.
And the food, particularly the peanut soup, is worth a trip in itself. Good-bye Shantou. Hello, Xiamen!

Last Sunday the winners of the Food Festival preliminaries gathered outside the Great Hall for the Festival cook-off.
Olympic-themed foods ruled.

Along with chicken

This multi-level wonder took first place. Its theme? The food of countries participating in the 2008 Olympics.

This beauty won the decorative food competition.

A student was crushed to discover Americans generally cast aside his favorite pig part, the head. His solution to encourage Americans to eat this yummy pork portion was to rename it “The Wonderful Head.” I didn’t have the heart to tell him pig wasn’t the problem. Head was.

Chinese love noshing on a noggin. Goose head is the most popular part of the bird in Shantou. No restaurateurs would dare serve a headless fish. Cheek meat is prized along with the rest of the cranial contributions: skin, lips, eyes. Our favorite Shantou Hunan restaurant serves a double portion of fish head: one side with a red hot sauce, the other green and milder. Two heads really are better than one.

Any American student could identify the ubiquitous Chinese item pictured here, even with its fancy chocolate coating, as a dessert delivered with the check at Chinese-American restaurants. Any Chinese student would be baffled. The most famous Chinese food in America is unknown in China.
In fact, fortune cookies weren’t invented in China at all, but in Japan, according to Jennifer Lee in “The Fortune Cookie Chronicles.” From Japan, they wandered over to America, where they sweetened up and joined other unknown-in-China dishes like egg foo young and sesame chicken at Chinese-American restaurants.
But they never crossed the sea to China. My fortune-deprived students have never had the frisson of discovery via cookie that, “Your talents will be recognized and suitably rewarded,” or “A secret admirer will soon send you a sign of affection.”
This particular cookie was wedding favor at Jeff and Rina’s wedding. Jeff wrote many of the fortunes including “I feel violated,” and this one that you very well might slip into your wallet after dining at your local chop suey joint.

Impress your friends with this simple to cook, delectable dish.

4 cups water
½ (1 kilogram) duck
3 large slices ginger
2 dried hot red peppers, seeded and cut in half
2 stalks green onion
5 cloves garlic
50 g. rock sugar
30 oz. (approx. 7) salted dried plums
1 ½ T plum sauce
½ T dark soy sauce

Add all ingredients, including duck to a wok. Bring to boil. Turn down to simmer, and turn duck over every 15 minutes. Cook for one hour.
Let cool for ½ hour. Chop into pieces with cleaver. Serves 4-5.

Tip: This recipe can also be made with pork leg.

In Episode 7, forget about a bird in the hand. This duck goes right into the pot in a scrumptious recipe that won’t ruffle your feathers.

Click here to download this episode.
(5:22. 13.8MB. Best viewed with QuickTime)

Download smaller mobile phone version.
(5:22. 5.1MB)

At our Shantou Wal-Mart, you might recognize Sam Walton’s smiling face on the Wal-Mart welcome sign, but not much else would be familiar. Bamboo sleeping mats, rice cookers, 100-year old eggs, and bottles of baijio fill our shelves. In the deli, instead of sliced meat, we buy Choashan snacks and Sichuan pickled vegetables.

Even we, fairly jaded shoppers at this point in our China life, were surprised by this little fellow in the photo. Was it bird? Bovine? Or even—gasp–dog? With a waggle of her index fingers over her head to indicate floppy ears, the deli employee solved the mystery. Rabbit. Perhaps not a best buy at American Wal-Marts, but we heartily enjoyed this crazy wabbit at our Sunday dinner.