The restaurant: Xiao Yang Barbecue. The two main things we look for in restaurants here are whether they are cooking and selling their food inside (we suspect it greatly increases the chances that somebody is inspecting them) and whether they have pictures on the menu. It's a leap of faith after that.
Kate, who gave us that advice, took us to a Chinese barbecue joint Thursday night. And we ordered ourselves our own personal Chinese buffet of grilled, seasoned, noodled, skewered, roasted, steamed and barbecued vegetables.
Kate, who gave us that advice, took us to a Chinese barbecue joint Thursday night. And we ordered ourselves our own personal Chinese buffet of grilled, seasoned, noodled, skewered, roasted, steamed and barbecued vegetables.
Some useful information Kate shared: Restaurants bring out the food in the order in which it is done. So food that we ordered seemed to keep arriving. And the custom is to order more food than can be eaten at one sitting. That, Kate said, stems from the hosts to provide enough that no guests leave hungry. "A clean plate isn't a good thing," Kate said. That also means the doggie-bag business is booming at restaurants.
First came the Lotus fruit and peanuts, which we realized later when we were doggie-bagging it also came on top of noodles.
After that came a selection of skewered barbecue Shitake mushrooms, barbecued green beans, steamed broccoli, cauliflower, tofu and squid on skewers, woodear mushrooms (whose name doesn't give them justice) with celery-like greens, vegetable rolls with spicy dipping sauce, spicy eggplant and bread and bean dip.
First came the Lotus fruit and peanuts, which we realized later when we were doggie-bagging it also came on top of noodles.
After that came a selection of skewered barbecue Shitake mushrooms, barbecued green beans, steamed broccoli, cauliflower, tofu and squid on skewers, woodear mushrooms (whose name doesn't give them justice) with celery-like greens, vegetable rolls with spicy dipping sauce, spicy eggplant and bread and bean dip.
Part of our vegetable feast.
Our waitress spoke zero English, so Kate handled most of the ordering, except she let me order several of the dishes by pointing to the picture and saying "This" in Mandarin, which is "zhege" -- pronounced jega.
Kate is a chopsticks master. But she taught us well. We only dropped a few things on the table. (Note the stray bean and peanut to the left -- that was all Elizabeth.)
Perhaps what's most amazing is that we got all this food -- and two 40-ounce bottles of Tsing Tau -- for the equivalent of about $25. And we have plenty left over for Friday night's meal.
- Ryan
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