China is an “eating culture,” so we spend a lot of time enjoying local food with our friends. Sometimes, the food is somewhat tame – veggies, spicy meat, and rice:
But then, there are other times. Recently while I was out with a friend, we stopped to have some pigs feet and pig brains:
Since this didn’t fill us up, we went down the road for some sausage. Most of it looked okay to me:
But when I asked my friend to pick his favorite, he chose the black cuttlefish ones for us:
Later in the week, I was eating noodles with a couple of other friends:
They also got an additional plate of meat to share:
Although they said that it was chicken hearts, the first bite tasted like liver (it turns out that there were hearts and livers). They then gave me something else to try:
It was a stomach, nicely cross-sectioned to reveal all of the internal structures. Yum!!!
A student recently returned from his hometown and called to let me know that he brought back a local specialty. We recognized the apples, but not the things that were wrapped in leaves. He told us to steam them for 10 minutes and enjoy:
They are called “maiba,” and are basically a wheat cake cooked inside of a sycamore leaf (baking is different when you live in a land without ovens).
Another student traveled south to help his family on their farm during the October holiday. While working, he encountered this snake:
His family farm is in a tropical area, and yes, they have cobras. He killed it and happily announced that they would feast on “dragon soup” that night:
Fortunately, we stayed in our city during the holiday!
And just in case you were wondering – yes, we do bow our heads and pray before every meal…
pig brains is a good reason to pray before you eat!! Bummer you missed out on eating the snake. The leafy bread stuff looks cool! Reminds me of the cream cheese pumpkin bread we just cooked (not!)
This makes me happy for Starbucks, Smashburger, and Blue Apron.