My Love, Chinese Food.

I love Chinese food.

I really love Chinese food. An absolute ridiculous amount. If I could write music, I would probably write ballads to Chinese food.

I know I posted some of these photos already, but I need to post them again for emphasis. 

 I knew when I decided to move out here that eating would be of little problem when the time came to settle in. Up to this point I have been mostly eating ramen noodles, which are my own personal version of heaven. Please feel free to judge me. I don't care. Chinese instant noodles are damn delicious. I literally have no idea what flavor I am eating 90% of the time. I just buy the noodles based on pictures and pray. 

The noodles range from 2.8 yuan-8.5 yuan and you can check the yuan-dollar conversion rate here. Salty, cheap, noodly, delicious heaven. My favorite are the noodles in the left of this photo, egg and tomato. I make a soup back home that has chicken broth, egg, tomato and cucumbers based on a dish I ate last time I visited Beijing. I tried the green one on the right last night.... not my favorite, but I was drunk enough that it tasted just fine. 

Just re-living Undergrad in Beijing.

These things. Ok, I say 'these things' because I haven't exactly figured out what they are yet, but they are one of my favorites. I shall now refer to them as Nommy Twists, at least until I figure out what they actually are.. Nommy twists are cracker/cookie-esque. They are not exactly sweet, but they aren't savory either. They are in cracker purgatory and they are addictive.

I like you Nommy Twisties.

My absolute favorite thing to eat here are these build-your-own-spicy bowls. They are delicious, but they can pack a punch. Not only a spicy punch, but a tummy aching punch simply because they use a lot of oil in their cuisine. Basically you take a bowl, fill it to your heart's content, they weigh it then spice it up with ridiculous peppers/peanuts/ cilantro and BAM! You are eating one of the best make-your-own-lunch- that-some-one-else-then-cooks you've ever had.

My favorite bowl is potatoes, tofu, mushrooms, lotssssssss of bean sprouts, bok choy, lotus root, bamboo tofu, some green squash thing whose name I haven't quite figured out yet, peanuts and cilantro. There is a photo of it at the top of this post. If I am feeling fancy I add a few Quail eggs, which are very yummy I might add, maybe some seaweed, whatever floats my boat. The bowls make you really full and the most expensive bowl I have made was 18 yuan (which is $2.90) which is probably why I have eaten three of them in the last four days.

The vegetables, so many!

There is a HUGE selection of meats. I haven't tried any because they cost more when weighed, but my coworkers seem to enjoy them!

I did not take any photos, but last night Melissa, Max, and I went to this fabulous Yunnan (a Province in the south of China) restaurant. We ate pineapple rice, beef wrapped around mint leaves, the most incredible spicy tofu I've ever tasted and this deep friend cheese-esque dish that was spectacular.

I have quite a bit of time to explore the foods of China, which is really exciting to me because I know there is quite an abundance of new flavors to try! I will let you know more as I explore more of the city!

I didn't eat these, but they are SO cute.