the chinese way of eating

i'm still not quite done with my eating adventures in china so bear with me!  one of the last nights we were in guangzhou, my cousin treated the whole family to a new way of eating in the huangsha area that i had yet to experience!  if you don't like seafood, then this isn't for you (and what's wrong with you?? i kid, i kid!).

in huangsha there are a few restaurants around that allow you to go to the seafood market below, purchase the seafood that you want, and then they'll cook it for you!  i can see how it is fun every once in a while, but for the most part when i go to a restaurant, it's cause i want to pick out something i want to eat, and then not do any work for it.

so after seeing our HUGE 22-seater table (with the largest lazy susan i've ever seen) equipped with our own couches and television, we headed down to the market to get some grub for dinner.

see. baller room.

snapshot of the market

sashimi grade salmon we purchased

geoducks! we didn't purchase...but i had to snap a photo

flower crab

mantis shrimp (aka 'peeing shrimp' in cantonese) and yes, the chinese have a different standard of cleanliness in their 'markets'

more crab

the goods for dinner! the waitress took note of everything we bought

the end result!! the best green onion crab i've ever had

 scallops--one of my favorite kinds of seafood ever!

shrimp

HUGE table

the cooked flower crabs

raw salmon. SO good. oh, and this was 1 of 3 trays...

pissing shrimp--probably least favorite dish of the night

there was SO MUCH food that night we didn't know what to do with ourselves.  this included a lot of supplemental veggie dishes that i didn't snap pics of.  having the huge lazy susan for 22 people didn't work out so well either.  essentially if the food passed in front of you, you exercised those ninja chopstick skills and grabbed what you wanted or waited for it to make the rounds in front of everyone else and hoped there would be something left on the plate the next time it came by you.  you can bet that i grabbed a piece of raw salmon every time!

international junk food

it's no secret that i like food.  but i LOVE junk food.  especially chips.  i'm a savory girl so i'll take chips over cakes, cookies and cupcakes anyday...unless they're red velvet ones cause those make me weak at the knees.  that was also quite the alliteration!

so whenever abroad, i look forward to the chip selection because the flavors you find are so exotic!  i can still recall the thai chili flavored pringles i had in angers, france that may be the best chips i've had yet.  i haven't seen them anywhere else though i haven't looked very hard.

this isn't my first time to china so i'm pretty familiar with the selection, but people are always inventing new flavors so i had to scope it out.  low and behold i found two verrrry interesting flavors:

yea...cucumber and cheese lobster.  how could i not get these?  who in this world makes cucumber flavored chips?  the chinese do.  i mean...lemon tea and blueberry were also in the running.  those flavors really exist i am not making this up.

the cucumber flavor did not taste like cucumber.  in fact, i made several family members eat the chips too and none of us could figure out what it tasted like.  i spent half the bag eating very slowly and occasionally trying to 'cleanse' the palette somehow to figure out but i gave up.  however, true to the bag's statements, there was an odd cooling sensation which just threw me off.  let me make that mistake for you and don't ever buy this flavor.

now onto the cheese lobster.  how could i not resist?  look at that saucer pouring thick velveeta-looking cheese onto the lobster?  the chinese can also take things a little too literally.  this bag was much more enjoyable than the cucumber one but this one didn't particularly taste like lobster either.  they nailed the cheese part, but the lobster bit just kind of tasted like some sort of seafood essence if that makes any sense.  in any case, the fam bam couldn't get enough of this one so there wasn't too much left for me.

if i wasn't so lazy, i would've gotten lemon tea and blueberry purely for curiosity purposes.  maybe next time ;)

FRESH food

i'm baaaack!  despite my good intentions to blog while visiting the fam bam in china for the last three weeks, i failed and i blame it on the strict communist internet, my laziness and generally just feeling lethargic from the heat/humidity.  i felt like i was being cooked in an oven.

but with that said, i want to turn your attention to the chinese's definition of fresh food.  while we in the states get most of our produce and meat from grocery stores, the chinese go to their local markets and ish there is fresh.  SO fresh that you can see the hearts still beating on the poor fish that have just been decapitated.  it was when i witnessed this that i knew that what we'd be eating that night was fresh.

it may be gross for some, but it's just how it is.  my cousin at dinner told me it must suck not being able to have 'fresh' chicken for dinner.  and by fresh she meant go pick out a live one from the market and promptly have it killed for that night's meal.  to which i replied, frozen really isn't all that bad, i swear ;)

anyway, some videos & fotos for your enjoyment.  i use that term loosely...

blue crab

 gutting fish

 true chinaman. gotta make sure that cig is lit.

it's communism's fault!!

i realize i have been on this wonderful streak of posting frequently and then all of a sudden it went to shit as soon as i took off for vacation.  i've had every intention to post things (taking pics of all sorts of goodness that has been adding fat to my thighs and bum) but i haven't been able to do much because of the commies!!!

facebook, twitter and blogspot are among many of the sites that are blocked by the prc (people's republic of china) therefore you need a vpn in order to access these sites, which i don't have.  however, i am now back in the land of hong kong where even though it's technically a part of the prc, i have interweb freedom!  yay!

posts will be coming soon :)