There is a saying in Guangzhou, - If something has its back to the sky, people will eat it. From a look at the menus in the city's many restaurants, this is something I have definitely found to be true. The first question people ask when you visit these restaurants is not what would you like to eat, but 'Rice or Noodles?' This is considered to be the most important thing, and then you choose which meat, fish etc, as if it were the side dish. Most of the restaurants near to the school where I teach are pretty cheap, (most less than a pound) so we can choose one for lunch and for dinner every day, where the staff are standing outside shouting 'Come and Eat' at every passer-by. The more exotic restaurants, or those situated in the central business district may have higher prices, but still usually under 10pound per person, including a couple of drinks, so we can go there on special occasions.
I visited a restaurant named 'Snake Water World' with one of my students the other day to try some snake. As we walked through the restaurant into the garden eating area, we saw many tanks filled with snakes, fish, and turtles. The waitress brought us the menu so we could choose which kind of snake we wanted, and whether we wanted one that was already prepared, or to go and choose a live one from the tank and have it caught and butchered for us. We opted for the former method. The student, Vivian, also ordered us some side dishes. Knowing that I wanted to try something different to conventional 'Western' food, she ordered some plates of snails and beetles! When the beetles arrived, she showed me how to eat them, picking them up with her chopsticks, popping a whole one into her mouth, then spitting out the head and wings. I tried the same method but it wasn't so easy, so she suggested I used my hands to rip off the head legs and wings, use the chopsticks to put the remaining carcass into my mouth. They were not as bad as I had expected, but they smelt horrible, not unlike a blocked drain. Next the snake arrived. It had been chopped up into small pieces, with the bone still attached, (very common in Chinese restaurants). For this we had to use the chopsticks to select a piece of snake, then pull the meat of the bones using our teeth. It had been fried so the texture was a little dry, a little like the dried fish I had been given with the beer for breakfast in Russia. It did not have a distinctive taste, slightly like chicken, (though I hate to use this cliche), but not as flavourful. To eat the snails we were supposed to pick them up with the chopsticks, then suck the bodies directly from their shells with our lips. I could not bring myself to do this method, so I used a toothpick to prise them out before eating them. Finally, under the impression I had not eaten enough weird things, Vivian decided to order a plate of chicken feet, and we had to suck the flesh off the claws, hmmmm. The whole meal cost about 11 pounds for two us us, including a couple of beers. The grand finale to the evening occurred as we were leaving and a giant sized rat run across my path from the direction of the kitchen. (Most rats run into the kitchen, not out of it, so I half expected it to be pursued by a knife-wielding chef, preparing yet another Cantonese Dish.
Chinese people take food very seriously. In fact a popular greeting in China is Ni Chi Le Ma? - Literally - 'Have you eaten? Every living creature, and indeed, every imaginable part of every creature, being used to feed China's enormous population. Earlier that day I had snacked on a bowl of cows insides for lunch. This consisted of liver, lung, heart and intestines, all chopped up into tough leathery pieces mixed with a sort of gravy and eaten with chopsticks. It wasn't all that bad, but not something I would want to eat again in a hurry, plus it smells pretty horrible.
On one of my days off I visited Qing Ping Market which supplies some of these restaurants. I saw many shops packed full of strange items; piles of strange looking mushrooms, sea horses, star fish, squid tentacles, exotic herbs and many other items, unidentifiable to the Western eye. Live turtles sat in bowls next to cages of frogs or snakes. Sad looking dogs were squashed in next to fluffy rabbits, and sleeping cats were stored under cages of squawking chickens and other poultry. On the shelves of one shop just above the deer horns, were bottles of 'viper wine', each with a giant pickled snake curled up inside the glass jars. Outside on the streets people counted, chopped, sliced, skinned and sold man different wares. I tried to take a sneaky photograph of a woman skinning some snakes but the flash went off and she saw me. A minute later she was chasing me down the road, and trying to whip me with a bunch of dried snake skins, while the onlookers watched with amusement. Perhaps a little different from the everyday scenes of Oxford Street.
I also went to another restaurant with a different student. We wanted to try the Thai-style frog but having waited for about 15 minutes our waitress came back and told us it was unavailable. As an alternative we choose to eat a pigeon, (now I know why there are so many Chinese around Trafalgar Square). When it arrived it had been cooked whole and the shape was exactly the same as a normal pigeon, with its head still intact, with eyes, beak etc. We used our hands to pull it apart and our teeth to pull the flesh off the bones until only the head and neck were left. My student, Richard, insisted I eat the head, so I had to rip off the flesh from around the eyes and beak with my teeth, whilst holding the neck, before scraping out the squidgy brain and eating that too! (Eat your heart out KFC!) It was a little like the duck I had eaten in Beijing, only not as tasty. Richard then asked if I liked spicy food to which I replied yes. A few minutes later a plate of cooked chillies arrived. Nothing else, just a big pile of chillies on a plate. Needless to say we had to have a couple of beers to help us wash them down. The whole meal including vegetables and the beers cost around 8 pound for both of us. Next week we will return for the frog.
So next time you are in a restaurant in China Town, just think to yourself, is this REALLY chicken?
Phil :-)
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