Wednesday, September 23, 2009

100 Chinese Foods to Try Before You Die

While we're listing goals...

I didn't do quite as well on this one.

[ETA - I'm updating this after my 2 1/2 months in Indonesia & SE Asia. Unsurprirsingly, there's a lot to add.]

  1. Almond milk
  2. Ants Climbing a Tree (poetic, not literal, name)
  3. Asian pear
  4. Baby bok choy
  5. Baijiu
  6. Beef brisket
  7. Beggar's Chicken
  8. Bingtang hulu
  9. Bitter melon
  10. Bubble tea - my favorite
  11. Buddha's Delight
  12. Cantonese roast duck
  13. Century egg, or thousand-year egg - not so bad, actually.
  14. Cha siu (Cantonese roast pork)
  15. Char kway teow - Indonesia
  16. Chicken feet - a little chewy for my taste
  17. Chinese sausage
  18. Chow mein
  19. Chrysanthemum tea
  20. Claypot rice
  21. Congee - (aka bubur ayam, in Indonesia. Pretty sure I also had it at a Vietnamese pace in Philly once.)
  22. Conpoy (dried scallops)
  23. Crab rangoon
  24. Dan Dan noodles
  25. Dragonfruit
  26. Dragon's Beard candy
  27. Dried cuttlefish - no, but I saw a vendor with a cart of them
  28. Drunken chicken
  29. Dry-fried green beans
  30. Egg drop soup
  31. Egg rolls
  32. Egg tart, Cantonese or Macanese
  33. Fresh bamboo shoots - picked 'em myself in Laos
  34. Fortune cookies
  35. Fried milk
  36. Fried rice - the only Chinese food I'd eat until age 10 or so, when I discovered wonton soup.
  37. Gai lan (Chinese broccoli)
  38. General Tso's Chicken
  39. Gobi Manchurian
  40. Goji berries (Chinese wolfberries)
  41. Grass jelly - I think so.
  42. Hainan chicken rice
  43. Hand-pulled noodles
  44. Har gau (steamed shrimp dumplings in translucent wrappers)
  45. Haw flakes
  46. Hibiscus tea aka jamaica aka Red Zinger
  47. Hong Kong-style Milk Tea
  48. Hot and sour soup
  49. Hot Coca-Cola with Ginger -????
  50. Hot Pot
  51. Iron Goddess tea (Tieguanyin)
  52. Jellyfish
  53. Kosher Chinese food
  54. Kung Pao Chicken
  55. Lamb skewers (yangrou chua'r) - street vendor in Flushing
  56. Lion's Head meatballs
  57. Lomo Saltado
  58. Longan fruit
  59. Lychee
  60. Macaroni in soup with Spam - eew?
  61. Malatang
  62. Mantou, especially if fried and dipped in sweetened condensed milk
  63. Mapo Tofu - my current favorite thing ever
  64. Mock meat
  65. Mooncake (bonus points for the snow-skin variety)
  66. Nor mai gai (chicken and sticky rice in lotus leaf)
  67. Pan-fried jiaozi
  68. Peking duck
  69. Pineapple bun - (the Indonesian variety)
  70. Prawn crackers - krupuk udang, served at nearly every meal in Malang
  71. Pu'er tea
  72. Rambutan
  73. Red bean in dessert form - once, as a child, thinking it was chocolate - never again.
  74. Red bayberry
  75. Red cooked pork
  76. Roast pigeon
  77. Rose tea
  78. Roujiamo
  79. Scallion pancake
  80. Shaved ice dessert
  81. Sesame chicken
  82. Sichuan pepper in any dish - Sichuan pepper in every dish!
  83. Sichuan preserved vegetable (zhacai)
  84. Silken tofu
  85. Soy milk, freshly made
  86. Steamed egg custard
  87. Stinky tofu
  88. Sugar cane juice - with lemon in a Singapore hawker center
  89. Sweet and sour pork, chicken, or shrimp
  90. Taro like a cross between a potato and an apple, except delicious. Helped harvest them in a little village in Java.
  91. Tea eggs
  92. Tea-smoked duck
  93. Turnip cake (law bok gau)
  94. Twice-cooked pork
  95. Water chestnut cake (mati gau)
  96. Wonton noodle soup
  97. Wood ear - I'm pretty sure
  98. Xiaolongbao (soup dumplings)
  99. Yuanyang (half coffee, half tea, Hong Kong style)
  100. Yunnan goat cheese

Another goal to aim for...

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:
"Here’s what I want you to do:
1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating."

Keeping in mind that I haven't eaten seafood or (corn-fed) beef in about 10 years...
[ETA - also updated after Indonesia etc. Not much longer, but way more badass.]

1. Venison - got some sausages in my freezer right now
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich - probably tried one at one point. I hate peanut butter. Jelly too, actually.
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart - long long ago...
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle - it was on a terrible dish of macaroni & cheese.
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes - wine tasting in CT. Strawberry. Not terrible.
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes - mmmmmm
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras - in Italy I was served some sort of liver - foie gras? pate? - rolled up in pork. Way too rich - I couldn't eat it.
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda - I've taken to eating the Northern Italian version, with olive oil, tomatoes, salt, pepper, & herbs on a good baguette. Fantastic in late summer.
31. Wasabi peas - yuck
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
X 38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O X - never tried a jello shot in college, though they were common. I'd like to think I've got the good sense not to do it now.
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail - sup buntut, an Indo specialty
41. Curried goat - no, but I did have goat satay
42. Whole insects - grasshopper tacos in New York, fried tarantulas in Cambodia, fried crickets in Laos, and silkworm larvae & a giant water beetle in Thailand. Tasty little buggers, for the most part (pun fully intended).
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk - goat cheese and yogurt yes, never straight milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more - Octomore
X 46. Fugu X - I'm not willing to risk death for a piece of fish. Sorry.
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi - at the Modern Languages Dep't party senior year of college, the same professor who'd just introduced me to Barolo offered me one of these. What a cruel trick.
53. Abalone - New Zealand, in fritter form.
54. Paneer - had some for lunch today, in fact.
X 55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal X
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine - Melted cheese & french fries... yum.
60. Carob chips - tastes like raisins.
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian - Durian cake from Singapore, actually; the beginner's version of the fruit. Kind of like the inside of a Fig Newton, but denser, stickier, and made of durian. Tasted like onions. ETA - had a durian shake in Malang. Fruit really shouldn't taste like onions.
66. Frogs’ legs - very tasty.
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake - all of the above
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe - I have a bottle of absinthe that I bought in Switzerland. Is it louche? I don't know.
74. Gjetost, or brunost
X 75. Roadkill X
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail - If rubber bands and dirt had a love child, it would be a snail. The garlic butter was good though.
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare - does rabbit count?
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
X 91. Spam X
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa - definitely harissa. Not sure if it was rose or not.
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake - cobra. First I drank its blood and bile from a shot glass, then ate the stir-fried meat for dinner. A little chewy, but not bad. And yes, I have pictures to prove it.

Friday, September 18, 2009

Speaking of Thai...

Thai recipes & ingredients: http://importfood.com/recipes.html