Elizabeth and the dumpling crawl March 24, 2011

Loosen your pants now, folks. It's gonna be a loooong lunch.

I stretched not only my stomach on this tour, but also my comfort zone. I am not a fan of Chinese food. I know, hard to believe, but true. When I read about this tour with the American Women's Club of Shanghai (AWCS) I thought, "Go on! Be bold! Be brave! Live a little before you die a lot". 

So off I went with eleven other women. Our first stop was the Bi Feng Tang restaurant. This is a chain, but a good chain.

My pristine place setting

Sesame-coated black bean paste balls

Not really a dumpling, but part of the tour. 

I did what I had to do.

The guts of above-mentioned ball

Not a favourite, but at least I can say I tried it.

Another new food

Fried dough stick encased in rice wrapper.

Hmmm....

See above comment on the sesame-coated ball.
It's a texture thing.
My friend Cynthia says China does "slime" very well.

Steamed pork dumplings

Not bad

Now we're talking! 

Fried pork dumplings.

We have a winner!

On to the next restaurant, Xibo, a place specializing in cuisine from the 

Xinjiang region in north-western China. It is home to many ethnic groups, most

notably the Uyghurs, who are Muslims. 

The decor was definitely interesting. 

Love the antique hats from the region.

Close up

These hats date back to the 19th-20th century.

Many were decorated withe brass bells, glass beads

and/or intricate embroidery.

A very cool collection

 View from the restaurant's terrace

Note the building being held up by steel girders.

Back inside Xibo restaurant

The antique hats were on the far wall near the entrance.

A table (duh!)

Each table could fit into any other like a jigsaw puzzle piece.

The light fixtures made of honeycomb paper

with a wall of reclaimed brick in the background.

Enough about the ambiance!

What about the food?

Here you go, beef rolls. OK, technically not dumplings, like the sesame-coated balls,

but delicious nonetheless. They tasted Mexican, thanks to the cumin.

Uyghur roasted bread which was a lot like pita.

Finally, dumplings

There were also steamed ones, but I preferred these.

Give me fried any day!

Xibo was by far the hands-down winner, in my opinion. We still had two more places to try.  Fortunately, we were walking from one restaurant to the next. It gave us the opportunity to make room for more dumplings!

Interesting architecture

A shame about those wires in the way.

I'll have to call the city and see what they can do about them.

Our next stop was a hot pot restaurant called Lai Fu Kitchen. I had never tried hot pot before; I was really getting into foreign territory! After sampling the food there, I don't think I ever need to eat hot pot again. It's not that it was bad, it just wasn't my style.

Our table

Cute plates

For those of you unfamiliar with hot pot, it's like Chinese fondue, but the meat variety, not cheese. There is a burner in the table where the (you got it!) hot pot goes. The hot pot itself is divided in half, one side has spicy broth with fish in it, the other side plain vegetable broth. There are many variations, but that's what we had. There was also a buffet of sauces, such as soy, vinegar, hot, and condiments, like coriander, onion and tomato, for the hot pot dumplings.

This sauce is for those wanting more fibre in their diet.

Guess which side of the hot pot has the spicy broth?

Close up of the raw pork dumplings

I was so glad we warned not to eat them before they went into the hot pot.

Nothing like a little trichinosis to get rid of those last pesky five pounds.

Tofu rolls in bondage

Let the cooking begin! Maybe that's why I didn't like this restaurant so much. I had to make my own food. That does not fit my definition of going out to eat. It puts it more in the category of camping and you all know how I feel about that activity.

This restaurant had a roti station. I know, very Chinese.

Here is the chef in action. You can see part of the condiment buffet in the background.

The dough went from this...

...to this...

... and finally to this.

I was mesmerized watching him toss the dough around. I need to get out more.

Equally mesmerizing was watching this woman make the pork dumplings. Really. I would have shot a video, but they take so long to upload. Just scroll down quickly for the video effect.

The gas burner, raw egg mixture and special dumpling-making spoon.

The raw pork filling

The dumpling maker poured raw egg mixture into the spoon, moved the spoon around to cook the egg, similar to making an omelette, then put in the pork filling, flipped half of the cooked egg over the filling, crimped the edges and voila! All done in a matter of minutes and with chopsticks no less. Impressive.

Here we go. Remember to scroll fast.

This would be a great job to have in the winter, nice and toasty warm, not so hot in the summer (ar, ar).

Finished here, we waddled walked to our fourth and final restaurant, The Four Seasons. No, not that Four Seasons. I wish! This was a converted house in the French Concession. We ate upstairs where the ceiling was so low even I could touch it. This place is well-known for its great value. We had more dumplings. You've seen them before, you don't need to see them again. Of note here were the candied yams. Not dumplings, true, but who could resist the crunchy, sweet exterior and soft interior. Not I!

The candied yams on a very Chinese lazy Susan.

You can make out the strands of caramelized sugar that resulted when the yams were served.

Mmmm....sugar....

Yours truly in a dumpling stupor.

All dumplinged-out, it was time to go home. No dinner for me that night. I was glad I went and tried new things, and in the process discovered one place I would certainly revisit. Adventure at any level is a good thing.