I went to China with my Mom in the summer, but I had no idea that my journey would turn into a culinary adventure. When I arrived at Shanghai Pudong international airport, I was so hungry. I couldn’t wait to try the different flavors of Chinese foods. I had the luxury to travel to a few cities during this trip. Some of the taste is stuck in my head many months later after I came back.
In my mom’s hometown, Yangzhou, there are a lot of delicious foods. I ate crawfish for the first time. Later, I learned that they are actually very popular everywhere in China. Crawfish look like a smaller version of lobster. However, they live in freshwater and not in saltwater. A lot of Chinese people like crawfish. There are different flavors of crawfish such as numb & spicy and garlic. The numb and spicy flavored crawfish were especially tasty. When I was in the restaurant, they gave us plastic gloves that are used to keep your hands clean. Wearing the gloves, I peeled the shell and ate the meaty tail. My relatives at the table were very kind to me, and I managed to devour almost half of the dish by myself. You can’t blame me, that was my first time eating crawfish.
In June, it's the waxberry season. These wax berries, also known as yang mei (杨梅), flourished in Hangzhou and Wuxi. They were red and plump, about the size of a ping pong ball. At, I assumed they grew in Yangzhou(扬州), but then my mom told me that the "Yang" (扬) in Yangzhou isn’t the same as the "yang"(杨) in yang mei. During our visit to Wuxi, wax berries seemed to cover every mountain, with merchants selling boxes of them at the mountain's base. After trying a waxberry, I was surprised to find it didn't taste waxy at all! Instead, they were sweet and juicy, with a unique texture. I also tried their yang mei juice, which provided refreshing relief from the hot summer in China.
In Shanghai, we explored a charming, ancient-style town with brick roads and bustling streets. The town was filled with numerous street vendors, offering a wide array of mouth watering treats. During our visit, I had the pleasure of dining at an authentic restaurant called “南翔小笼包” (Nanxiang Xiaolongbao). At this restaurant, I ate the xiao long bao, which are small steamed dumplings filled with savory broth and flavorful ingredients. Each bite was a hot burst of flavor as the broth seeped out, hugging my taste buds. To make it taste better, I dipped these delicious dumplings into vinegar, adding a contrast of flavors that made them even yummier.
In the capital, Beijing, I enjoyed Peking duck almost every single day. The duck had tender meat that I could wrap in dough with sauce, cucumber, and scallion. You could also take the crispy duck skin and dip it into sugar. Surprisingly, it tasted quite good. I also tried tang hulu from a street vendor. The crunchy syrup and crispy rice paper turned the sour hawthorn berries into a sweet, candy-like flavor.
When my mom and I visited Nanjing, we explored a bustling tourist attraction called “夫子庙” with our relatives. The place was swarming with tourists. After we managed to escape the crowds, we headed to a restaurant called the “Qinhuai Snack Museum,” a lovely restaurant, located on the banks of the Qinhuai River. There, we ordered a dish that consisted of 16 small snacks, including duck blood soup. While duck blood might seem exotic to someone in America, in China, it's just an ordinary dish. Duck blood has a texture similar to tofu but has a more complex flavor that left me craving for more.
As I traveled from city to city, I tried all kinds of signature local foods. From the canals of Yangzhou to the Forbidden City of Beijing, from the bustling streets of Shanghai to the historical grounds of Nanjing, the food allowed me to taste the tradition and culture of China. Throughout my travels, I realized that China's rich culinary culture was as diverse as its landscapes, and I enjoyed every moment of this flavorful adventure.
