Shanghai Yummies-pt 2

Here comes my part II culinary experience in Shangahai.

WARNING: Tons of photos!!Viewer adviced to take lunch before read this.

First day breakfast cum lunch at office canteen, pathetic western food with the burger patty sweet taiwanese hotdogs, mash potatoes, seaweed soup, salad and fruits. Its nice and filling but nothing much to shout about. A bit expensive though, the whole set comes at RMB28 (RM14).

Went to the famous Shanghai Shopping street- Nanjing street on the first night. Even though its nearly 10pm, the place was still congested and flooded by sea of shoppers. To some extent, the scenery and the cool breeze reminded me of the pedestrian shopping street in UK, but with a mix of local (Chinese advert, colorful neons lights) and foreign (branded clothes, shoes and the fast food restaurant) scent, and of course the major difference is that in UK, all shops closed at 5pm, but in Shanghai, the city never sleep.

Nanjing Shopping Street

Found some old looking chinese restaurant at a corner of the street. Without much expectation i just walked in for a bowl of beef noodles to warm up my body.

To sit alone in a table of four is a bit funny though, as i'm surrounded by families of Chinese people eating and chatting happily among themselves with a full table of food.

I went for the beef noodle (RMB 10) and of course a tray of siao long bao (RMB10). The portion of the beef was pretty generous, a bit raw but tasted fine. A bit similar to Vietnamese's Pho but with Chinese yellow noodles and lacking the fragrants taste of basil and mint leaves.

Here comes the second day luxurious lunch which causes RMB200++

My first impression of the first dish is: Sze Chuan style meat! as the '花椒' (a type of chinese pepper) smell and the layer of spicy oil floating on top reminds me of the sze chuan's steamboat which i had once in Liverpool. Turned out to be i'm half correct, yes, its sze chuan style, but its not pork or chicken, its

FROG MEAT!!!

I'm at horror when the host told me that its not even frog (田鸡) but bigger frog (toad??) (牛蛙). Chinese describe it as the cow frog, which is bigger and unglier than the green color frog which we usually saw. Nevertheless, The meat was tendy but quite bony though.

Here is my favourite PORK with a big layer of juicy fat! it tasted heavenly with the chili oil



The 'lobak' 酥 with yummy shredded lobak inside and coated with sesame seeds outside, very crunchy and hot



豆鼓猪肉丝(fermented bean pork) with alot of onions slices, but a bit too salty


莲藕 (lotus roots) with sweet glutinous rice inside the hole of the root, yummy.


Toufoo soup with alot of corriander


Stir fried beans with 丝瓜, looks simple but surprisingly sweet and fresh

Of course and a good cup of tie kunyan chinese tea to wash off the fats and oil

i skipped the second night dinner as my heart was tormented and churned by guiltiness for eating so much for lunch, as an act of repentance, i ate ........ siao long bao instead. hahahaha... no difference.

The third day i was in a rush to airport so only managed to catch a fast meal. This is so called the chinese fast food restaurant, 东方既白，i have no idea why it was named in that way as it sound like rude words actually (pronouced as 'tong fang ji bai' in chinese, geddit?). The environment was similar to KFC and McD and they served food in seconds! However being a fastfood restaurant, it also came at fast food restaurant price, RMB 25 (RM12.50), a bit expensive though.

I went for a simple meal with the 卤肉饭 (pork cooked in soy sauce for long long time) and the Black Glutinous rice desert. The rice was so tender and it came with an 卤蛋egg and chicken wing as well. The desert is similar to the Malaysian Nyonya black glutinous rice deserts, except that its used cream and was cold , rather than with Coconut milk and hot.

Overall, it was alright. I am very much enjoyed and accustomed to Chinese food but for some reason, during that 3 days trip, i missed nasi lemak sambal more than ever!