Eating Chinese in China

And then she put the platter down — right in front of me. I couldn’t stop staring at its occupant. It was what looked like a whole raw fish, floating in its watery grave, looking up at me with its round mournful eyes, its little mouth curled up in a sad smiley, perhaps terrified at the imminent danger of being shredded into bits and eaten up. But forget eating, none of my Indian team members had the guts to even touch it. 

It was the famous Mandarin Fish, which my research had told me was a must-have in Shanghai. In fact, we had already tried it at a restaurant in Shanghai’s Chinatown the previous day. And, the experience had been quite harrowing. The fish had looked slightly more ‘cooked’ than this one and the sauce had been less watery. And yet, the fish had been horribly smelly. So, it was hardly surprising that there was no daredevil in our team willing to try it out the second time.

But our Chinese hosts could not be offended either. So finally, as it was usual with food in China, I decided to act the martyr (or guinea pig) yet again and dolefully picked up my fork to scrape out a bit of the fish. But I was in for a pleasant surprise. The flesh flaked smoothly off the bones. And when I hesitantly put it in my mouth, I got a relief. It wasn’t smelly; in fact it was very tasty — soft, juicy and bearing a subtle flavour of the sauce that had bits of coriander leaves floating in it.

Only after my teammates had shrewdly studied my reaction did they all cautiously scrape out their share of the fish. And then, within moments, the fish was gone with the whole lot of them singing paeans in its praise!

Luckily for us, the Mandarin Fish that we got served henceforth were all clones of this one and not the one at Chinatown. And every time, it would simply disappear off the table before we could say ‘Mandarin’.

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My teammates’ apprehension wasn’t without reason. Indian and Chinese food habits — and eating etiquettes — are poles apart. Take rice for instance. Though a large section of the Chinese and Indians eat rice, the way it’s eaten is vastly different. In India, it’s the staple and everything else — whether it’s daal (lentils), vegetables or fish or meat — is side dish. The daal, vegetables or curries are meant to be poured into the rice in a plate, mixed with fingers or spoon and eaten off the plate.

In China, the rice comes as a side dish (at least that’s what we were served). It’s the sticky rice variety that is meant to ‘soak up’ any sauce or gravy that any of the dishes may have been cooked in. And instead of a plate, the rice, mixed with the sauce, is supposed to be eaten off a small bowl — obviously to make it easier to scoop up with chopsticks.

But this is only a minor dissimilarity. The worst comes in terms of meat. The Chinese — despite most being Buddhists — are voracious meat-eaters. And meat mostly comprises pork and beef. But two of India’s largest religious groups don’t eat at least either one of the two. Most Hindus don’t eat beef; some don’t eat pork either; some are completely vegetarian; and some are ‘eggtarian’ (i.e. they eat only eggs among non-veg food). Muslims, on the other hand, don’t eat pork.

What makes things even more complicated is that some of the orthodox vegetarian Hindu communities won’t even have vegetarian dishes cooked in the oil or utensil that was used to cook non-vegetarian items. Neither will non-vegetarians eat anything cooked in oil after beef was cooked in it. Forget oil, some won’t have food off the table on which non-vegetarian food is being served.

Here’s more. In Indian meals, people are served their portions on their own plate with a common ladle that no one will use to have their food or even touch while eating their meal. Diners at a Chinese table, on the other hand, keep picking their portions off the common platter through the meal. The revolving tabletop would be spun round and round and everyone would help themselves with their own chopsticks. Among Indians, this would be akin to defiling the food (jhootha; ayntoin Bengali). 

So, for the conservative vegetarians in our group, the only option was to carry their own food all the way from India, enough for those 10 days. They would join us at tables out of politeness and valiantly undergo torture for an hour, watching people eat ‘nauseating’ stuff. I remember one of them joking after the Mandarin Fish meal that every time the tabletop would be spun, the fish would come to rest right in front of him, looking up at him helplessly from its puddle of misery. 

For the less conservative vegetarians, there used to be a veggie platter. But it was such a sorry sight that I’d wonder how they’d survive the trip. On most days, I would see a plateful of gram sprouts coming for the vegetarians. Fruits would come regularly too, at the end of a meal. Tofu, bok choy (Chinese cabbage), mushroom, lotus stem or seaweeds would come every other day; potato or eggplant occasionally.

Evidently, China is no country for vegetarians — at least not the Indian kind.

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So, I can tell you what the beef or pork dishes were like. Unfortunately, they tasted more or less the same everywhere. Except for a delicious pork curry that we were served on the flight from Shanghai to Taiyuan, most of the dishes were plain, dry preparations of processed meat, coming in bite-size or slightly larger pieces — again, possibly to make these easy to eat with chopsticks, with which you can’t slice things. There would usually be a dip to go with these. But there was no use of herbs or spices and nothing came in gravy or sauce — inherent features of Indian meat dishes which help set the preparations apart from each other.

One exception was the ‘hotpot’ at Datong in Shanxi. Being only two and a half hours’ drive from Mongolia, Datong has a bit of Mongolian influence in its food. It is comparatively hot as well as sour, and suited Indian taste buds fairly well. Possibly a result of the harsh winters of the region, the hotpot is a meat-and-vegetable stew that is served on a low flame — much like a fondue. The meat can be anything — beef, pork, lamb, chicken — depending on availability I guess. There was a rustic feel to the dish and every time we had it, it was quite delicious. 

Datong seemed to be quite famous among the Chinese for its food. At the Datong hotel, we were also served a lot of ‘seafood’ — clams, oysters, whelks, prawns, squid, fish... Since Shanxi is landlocked, I believe these are bred in freshwater. But the dishes were quite delicious.

We found some strange preparations on offer at the buffet — sheep’s hooves and rabbit’s head. I took a helping of both and battled them for 10 minutes, but could not make much headway. The hoof was hard as a bone and the head reminded me of the maachher muro (fish head) that we Bengalis are so fond of. Unless you know how to tackle them, it’s best to leave them alone.

I could not know the origin of such food, but from what our guide Phillip said, it could be the days of famine in the late 1950s and early ’60s. A less common form of greeting in China, “Ni chi le ma?” which is used even today, means, “Have you eaten?” and dates back to the famines. A very personal connotation of this greeting could mean, “Please eat with me.”

But ask an average Bengali what the Chinese eat and he’s likely to screw up his nose and say, “Oh my god, they eat cockroaches!” I don’t know who was the first Bengali to see a Chinese gobble up roaches, but it’s something I’ve heard since childhood. Since the association between the two peoples goes back hundreds of years, it’s difficult to tell without some research how such ideas bore fruit, but it’s also true that during our stay in China we never got served any roaches. Much to my disappointment, actually.

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But in Shanghai, we were asked to choose from a variety of chopped meat and vegetables. The rest looked fairly similar. The same old sooty wok, the energetic frying of the noodles on a high flame, similar sauces... It tasted quite spicy too, just like home. And the flavours were far more pronounced that what we were served at the restaurants. In Kolkata, the stuff we get at most restaurants is just a sophisticated version of the street-food, only with a lot more variety.

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In fact, I felt that the hallmark of Chinese food is its subtlety. To mark the characteristics of Chinese regional food, there’s apparently a saying that the ‘north is salty, south is sweet, east is hot and the west is sour’. I found ‘north’ quite sour too, thanks to the liberal use of Shanxi’s famous vinegar. Datong was quite hot as well. But, neither was the hot too hot or the sour too sour. Same for the sweet — it wasn’t too sweet. Subtle.

The sesame cakes of a local bakery that we found in Shanghai were delicious as well. Some may find them a little dry, but I enjoyed them.

But my favourite were the almond jellies that we had at a restaurant in Taiyuan, at the fag end of the journey. The dry climes of Shanxi had left me parched and when I saw the almond jellies soaked in sugar syrup at the ‘Desserts’ section I wanted nothing else. I remember I had only pastries and 4/5 bowls of almond jellies for lunch. Some of it came with bits of fruits too and was delightfully refreshing. 

The Chinese make some nice candies but apparently the chocolates are not very good. Our Chinese host himself prevented me from buying chocolates to carry back home. But while buying candies, you have to be careful too because what you may believe to be ‘candy’ may well turn out to be something else. Most of the stuff written on the packs is in Chinese — which is true for all packaged food — and asking doesn’t help much either because hardly anyone speaks English.

And even if it’s written in English, it may leave you puzzled. I remember getting a packet of ‘Jujubes’ from someone and finding out that it contained dried dates. Technically not wrong, but not everyone’s idea of jujubes either, right?

I believe the worst experience for Indians at mealtime was the lack of drinking water. Cold water, that is. The Chinese don’t believe in drinking cold water with their meals and one of our teammates found it out at the expense of scalding his tongue.

It was in Datong. There was loads to drink — juice, beer, tea, coffee... But being Indian, he wanted a simple glass of water. Unfortunately, there was no ‘water’ available at the restaurant of the five-star hotel. The staff looked perplexed on why someone should even ask for ‘water’ at mealtime. Finally, when he explained through frantic gestures he wanted to drink it, he was served scalding hot water, of which he took a large sip unsuspectingly. The rest is best left unsaid.

The Chinese people wash down their food with large quantities of green tea. This too has an extremely delicate flavour and to most of us, it smelled and tasted like nothing but hot water. But some of our teammates did seem to enjoy it and would down cups of green tea even in their spare time.

Personally, I enjoyed the baijiu immensely, which I have already mentioned in Shanghai Nights. It’s the most popular alcoholic drink made in China and has a very sweet flavour. It’s not very expensive either and comes in some pretty packages that look like vases. You can save the bottles as souvenir.

Baijiu has different names in different regions. The one in Shanxi is called Fenjiu, named after the local Fen River. Asking the hotel staff what it was made from was an adventure in itself. The first woman I asked did not speak English. She hurriedly went and found someone who did. But the second woman had no clue what it was made from. She ran to someone who apparently did. Then she came back to me and said, “milk.” “Milk?” I asked incredulously. “Yes, milk,” she giggled nervously.

My subsequent Internet researches have not corroborated her claim. Fenjiu is made from sorghum. In fact, no variety of baijiu is made from anything that comes remotely close to milk.

Anyway, the drink is a must-try if you are in China. And if you are out drinking with your Chinese friends, etiquette says you should raise a toast as many times as you possibly can. No number of ‘Cheers!’ is considered too many at a Chinese dinner.

So, let’s drink to that. Cheers! … Cheers!

… Cheers!

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Mandarin Fish in Shanghai

Hotpot in Datong, Shanxi

Seafood in Datong, Shanxi

Glass noodles in Shanxi

Almond jellies (available in restaurants)

Sesame cakes (available in stores as well as restaurants)