In my last post, I reviewed Beyond the Great Wall: Recipes and Travels in the Other China, in which the authors (Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid) present a plethora of delightful dishes from all parts of China, all of them delicious-looking (and some of them–like the dumplings–fairly easy to make). I also mentioned how I was intrigued that the authors didn’t include some of the more (shall we say) “interesting” foods to be found in the Middle Kingdom–delicacies like fried scorpions, duck tongues, and pig lung soup. (I’ve had the pig lung soup–”Very good for you if you have chest congestion,” my Chinese friend Elizabeth assured me–and I’ve tried to eat a duck’s tongue–eeuuww, little tiny bones–but managed to avoid eating any scorpions, dead or alive.) Surely this book was written to be culinarily “correct” by focusing only on the ethnic dishes that would also be appealing to a western audience. Hmmm. I needed to find someone who would tell the whole truth about eating in China.

I found her. Her name is Fuchsia Dunlop (isn’t that a great name?), she’s British but speaks fluent Chinese, is an award-winning food writer, and has “vowed to eat everything she was offered, no matter how alien and bizarre it seemed.” This was the Chinese food reviewer I was looking for.

Her book is Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China, and in it she describes what she calls the Chinese “refined appreciation of food,” which includes the ability to distinguish between “the bouncy gelatinous quality of sea cucumbers, the more sticky, slimy gelatinousness of reconstituted dried squid, and the chewy gelatinousness of reconstituted pig’s tendons.” (Personally, I am no big fan of anything “gelatinous,” including jello.)

And if you’re not familiar with sea cucumbers, here’s what they look like:

Yum! Yes?

And that’s not all. “Imagine, if you will,” Fuchsia exhorts us, “an entire banquet based on duck: wings, webbed feet, liver, gizzards, intestines, tongues, hearts, heads, skin and flesh, each part cooked according to its particular character! That combination of intellectual thrill with raw, sexy, sensual pleasure!” I’m not convinced. I love a crispy cooked duck as much as the next person, but only the breast or leg, please. Duck feet? No thanks.

And speaking of feet, I remember once when my former colleague Barrett Mandel and I were in a Beijing restaurant and decided to order chicken soup, as it was cold outside and we both had the snuffles. Soon the waitress brought us a large covered tureen, lifted off the lid, and revealed an entire chicken, happily soaking in a broth bath. Yes, there was Chicken Little, head still on, and feet still attached. And those feet–big, swollen, and rubbery! ‘Twas the stuff of nightmares. Then I find out from Fuchsia that another Chinese delicacy is “stewed bear’s paw,” for which she has provided an actual recipe! Step One: “Singe the bear’s paw in a naked flame, taking care not to damage its skin. Soak it in boiling water for one hour and then strip away the fur.”

And I’m wondering: What did they do with the rest of the bear?

Thankfully, Fuchsia goes on to assert that such dishes are the exception, not the norm, and that “the traditional diet of the Chinese masses could be a model for the entire human race . . . steamed rice or boiled noodles, served with plenty of seasonal vegetables, cooked simply; beancurd in many forms; very few sweetmeats; and small amounts of meat and fish that bring flavour and nourishment to the table.” Whew–nice to know that I can go back to Beijing (in November) and eat healthily and happily.

At first it looked like it was going to be a repeat of the tragic ravioli incident of 1972.

(In which I attempted to make my own ravioli, but the dough was so thick and elastic that I just gave up, put the meat sauce stuffing on these giant slabs of dough, crimped the edges, then gently lowered them into a large pot of boiling water, whereupon they all opened up and dumped their contents on the bottom of the pot.)

The authors of Beyond the Great Wall: Recipes and Travels in the Other China,  Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid, recommended using the recipe for Kazakh Noodles to produce enough dough for 64 dumplings (jiaozi). It certainly looked easy enough: Put 3.5 cups of white flour, 1 teaspoon salt, and 2 large eggs in a food processor. Process briefly and then, with the blades spinning, add about 2/3 cup lukewarm water until the mixture forms a ball. Knead briefly on a lightly floured surface.

Maybe I kneaded the dough a little too long? Because when it came time to divide the dough up into little 2- by 3-inch ovals (all 64 of them), I found it very difficult to get the dough thin enough to place a 1.5 teaspoon clump of the fillings (I made two kinds: one with leeks and pork, the other with carrots and pork) in the center and then enclose them by crimping the edges. (Thoughts of that long-ago ravioli failure began to haunt me.) Jeffrey and Naomi offered some scant assurance: “Don’t worry if some of the dumplings are irregularly shaped.” Irregularly shaped? Mine were pretty uniformly shaped. In fact, they looked suspiciously like a batch of empanadas:

[Note: If you're not familiar with them, empanadas are a very popular stuffed pastry in the Southwest and Mexico. They can be stuffed with something sweet, like fruit, or meat, just like jiaozi.]

It took me almost two hours to make the 64 little dumplings, all the while sweating and hoping that my crimping would hold and they would successfully survive the boiling in the pot with their innards still inside. I was somewhat concerned that I seemed to have quite a lot of leftover stuffing, but then just decided to make some brown rice and add it to the sauteed stuffing as a side dish.

My father and son soon  arrived for our traditional Sunday dinner and I warned them that this Sunday would not be like other dinners–it would be an “experimental” meal, and they would be my “volunteers” to taste the delights of real Chinese dumplings. (I also told them that I had a Plan B if the dumplings blew themselves up: I would send my husband out for pizza.)

Finally the moment of truth was at hand, and I set a large pot of water to boil on the stove (with a handful of goji berries thrown in, an authentic Himalayan touch, according to Jeffrey and Naomi). Into the churning broth I plopped the first 10 jiaozi. I paced around the kitchen for one minute and then lo and behold, the little darlings popped up to the surface, their insides intact, hooray! Whew.

Then the tasting began, and I must say my dad and my son were very complimentary. Here’s Dad enjoying his:

And here’s my son Brando obviously delighted (if also slightly deranged) by the experience:

Everyone agreed that the jiaozi were very tasty, but also very thick. And chewy. Too chewy. Somehow the proof was in the dough and it hadn’t come out like the delicious dumplings I had eaten so often in Beijing. I suspect it was the kneading that resulted in the thick dough. After all, it’s the same as making a pie crust: If you handle the dough too much, it’ll be too thick. I’ll have to think about how to rectify this problem.

In the meantime, here are two things I learned from my jiaozi experience:

1. This is a very labor-intensive, very boring process. It would probably be much more fun to have a dumpling-making party, with many hands making the chore much more enjoyable.
2. No matter how thick or chewy the dumplings, the dipping sauce (soy sauce mixed with rice vinegar) makes them utterly delicious.

The next time I go to China, I’m going to see if I can get one of my Chinese students to wrangle me an invitation into an actual Chinese kitchen, so I can observe the proper procedure for getting the dough right.

Yow zuh!

Well, not exactly “late” night, as it’s only 7:15 PM here in Beijing, but it feels like late night to me because for many of the people I know and love in New Mexico, it’s 4:15 AM.

I’ve been thinking of what I dislike most and like most about China, on this, my 11th voyage to the Middle Kingdom. First, the dislike category.

The communication gap is, of course, a big problem. As for instance last night, when I tried to get a cab to take me to the restaurant where I would be meeting my colleague Deb and her family, and after I got in the cab (at my hotel), the driver turned the car off and just sat there. Um, what’s the problem, I asked. Grunt, he replied. OK, I figured that he was reluctant to take me because the restaurant was “too close” (although a pretty far walk for me) and wouldn’t be worth his time. “I’ll pay you double,” I told him. He grunted again and pointed to his ear, clearly meaning that he couldn’t understand what I was saying. OK, I thought. Maybe money talks. So I took out 25 RMB and waved it at him (his usual fare for such a short trip would be 10 RMB). OK! he said, and off we went. Success! It ended up costing me a whopping $3.91, but the aggravation was in the failure to communicate the first time.

But hey, maybe we did communicate successfully. But it made me very nervous . . .

It also gets really old here that pedestrians NEVER have the right of way. It’s just a constant worry about crossing an intersection and hoping not to get mowed down by a car turning right ON A RED LIGHT WITHOUT STOPPING and even though the WALK SIGN IS CLEARLY FLASHING. When I told a Chinese friend of mine here that in the US pedestrians actually do have the right of way and that cars have to stop for us, she was amazed, couldn’t believe it.

And the air is really bad here. Some mornings, I can’t see the buildings pretty much across the street, the pollution is so bad. The Chinese know this too, and are very worried. It remains to be seen if there is anything that can be done about it, and soon. Ack. Ick. Gack.

OK, now for the good news. On rare days, the sky is blue, the sun is shining, and Beijing is absolutely beautiful (as much as a big city can be, anyway). And then there are the Chinese people who are just delightful (unlike my grunty cab driver). Some years ago I was on a bus here in Beijing and a lovely elderly woman pulled on my sleeve and insisted I sit on the empty seat next to her.

And then there are my students, who “love” me. (No kidding, one of my students just sent me a “Happy Thanksgiving” email which ended with, “We love you.”) I have such an amazing assortment of students this year: Chinese, of course (the majority), but also Iranian, Brazilian, Malaysian, Korean, Turkish, Russian, South African, Nigerian, Swiss, Italian–I feel like I’m teaching at the UN! And I am learning so much from them.

So I guess it all comes down to this: Beijing is like any other big city (17 million people!) with all the “horrors” of a big city (pollution, difficulties just crossing the street, smashed up against each other on subways), but its people are spectacular. And very dear to me.

So here I am again, another fall semester of teaching at the Beijing International MBA (BiMBA) program, and marveling at the warmth and sunshine of Beijing in November. (There are still roses in bloom!)

I have been eating at some wonderful restaurants here (more and more places have English menus, yay) and it occurred to me that there are two things about Chinese restaurants that I have experienced, one a little annoying, the other actually very nice.

In a Chinese restaurant, the minute you are seated, the waitress comes over and stands next to you, pen poised over pad, to take your order. This is slightly nerve-wracking, as typically the menu is EXTENSIVE (just like in the States, there are an amazing number of selections), and it could take awhile to go through it all. But there’s that waitress waiting, waiting, waiting. So one (me) is forced to zoom through the menu quickly so as not to keep the waitress waiting too long. This is somewhat annoying.

Then, after you have ordered and your food has arrived, you never see the waitress again until you actually flag her over for the bill. This part I really like. No waitperson hovering, hovering, asking, “Is everything all right?” (NO! I want to yell. IT TASTES LIKE GARBAGE! just to see what the reaction would be.) No “Can I get you anything else?” No “Can you hurry up and finish because we have this table reserved for another party?” No, no, no, one (me) is left in peace until I decide my time is up.

I’m still trying to decide who is more civilized here. (I’m leaning towards the Chinese.)

Flying back home today (Tuesday, Dec. 7). It’s been an adventure, as always, but maybe our last night in China was the best adventure of all. See it here.

I just finished a very interesting book about learning Mandarin, called “Dreaming in Chinese: Mandarin Lessons In Life, Love, And Language (by Deborah Fallows), and it occurred to me that it was time to list all the words/phrases I knew in Chinese (after four years and ten times of coming here), just to see how long the list is.

Beijing University, West Gate
Beijing University, East Gate
Dumplings
Steamed Buns
Beer
Salt
Hello
Goodbye
Thank you
Rice
Tea
Doggie Bag

And I can count to ten.

So this makes me, I figure, on the same sophisticated language level as, oh, maybe a two-year-old? (And the Chinese two-year-old child would of course produce much better tones than I can.)

My reading ability is much, much worse (if that can even be possible). I can recognize the characters for one (one horizontal line), two (two horizontal lines), and three (three horizontal lines). I know the character for people/person (looks like a very skinny abstract Gumby). And that’s it.

Good thing pantomime is indeed a universal language!

My full-time class ended today (Monday, Nov. 29) and, as is always the case, the students insisted on taking a class picture with me (their most beloved professor, of course). When Chinese people take a picture, they often say their version of our “Cheese!” to make a smile. The word they use is qie zi (KAY-juh, is the pronunciation, I think), which means “eggplant.”

So here we are, smiling away (Click on the picture to make it bigger):

Entree on the menu in a rather posh Chinese restaurant here in Beijing:

“Stir BBQ Pork with pleurotus nebrodensis”

Excuse me?????

OK, should I be worried? Because the Koreas are RIGHT OVER THERE. Everyone here in Beijing (the ones I come in contact with, like my students) are somewhat concerned about this situation. Most of them pooh-pooh the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) crazies and think they’re basically harmless. Yeah, right. Crazies with (maybe) nuclear weapons.

I didn’t have to worry so much about this when I was in New Mexico. But here in Beijing . . .