‘China’ Archives
Pizza Hut Now Serving Escargots
Remember Pizza Hut and how it began serving pasta in 2008? It actually serves quite a diversified menu in China, where I snapped this photo of escargots for offer last summer in Chengdu. Along with one of the saddest salad bars I've had the displeasure of sampling, they served a variety of pastas and hot-dogged pizza crusts. Slice, take note. (more...)
Drinks at M Bar at the Mandarin Oriental
M Bar at the Mandarin Oriental reminds me of Shanghai's slickly overproduced watering holes. The difference is that in China, these kinds of establishments stock only the most svelte and snowy-skinned of waitstaff, the kind with faces that inspire as much protection as possession. (The physicality of Chinese beauty hits you in a very different way from Western beauty. Even at its most [...]
International food porn – Quails on sticks, donkey meat, prawns.
Some underwhelming prawns at Private Kitchen 44 in Beijing. Donkey meat in Beijing at Noodle Loft... like beef, but with a gamier, greasier mouthfeel. (more...)
The Best Hairy Crab Roe in Shanghai, or, a Shanghai Dining Editor’s Must Eats List
Back during my tony days interning at City Weekend Shanghai, the benevolent dining and health editor would spit out recommendations with the efficiency of a finely tuned machine. I recently asked her for some recommendations for a friend in Shanghai, and I wished I had had this list when I was there. So in case you ever make your way to the Middle Kingdom's most cosmopolitan city, consult this [...]
Crunchy cartilage-laden chicken
I stumbled upon a Cantonese restaurant this summer when I was waiting for my friend to finish up work in Beijing. I had just had the worst "soup dumplings" of my life a few shops over where they were more steamed buns with juice inside that had long since leaked out. In desperation for a good meal, I saw a few people eating something delicious through the large glass windows of this restaurant [...]
The Coolest Bartender Ever
Here's a bartender who can really shake it doing some crazy tricks with his weapons of choice at LAN Club in Beijing. This was where I tippled on a sample of mixologist's Mao's summer cocktails while bonding with the super fabulous PR guy about the crappy gay expat scene in China. No matter where I go, it seems, my fag hag abilities are never wasted. I was actually there on work. My goal: [...]
Starbucks in China: The Good, The Bad, and the Sugarfree
While Starbucks is sometimes seen as a monolithic coffeeslinger to the upwardly mobile masses, the coffee chain's branches abroad don't entirely conjure up home. Though it's mostly a deliciously familiar task of navigating between tall, grande, and venti, be it NYC or Shanghai, I felt alienated at times without my standby sugarfree option and decent English magazines. (I wrote about how much I [...]
See my campy modeling spread; read my silly articles
Hi denizens of the world wide web and faithful readers of my blog, you might be interested to know that I've been hard at work updating the content. I've scanned a bunch of my reviews and articles from City Weekend, including my super-camp "Shanghai seduction" spread, and added some FAQ's to answer all those burning questions. Feel free to ask more questions. I promise to post answers. Unless you [...]
Capsule Review: Yak Butter Tea
Based on a tip by the City Weekend dining editor, I sought out something really exotic for a quick cafe break: yak butter tea. I already had warm and fuzzy feelings attached to yaks since a good friend from high school interned at Shokay, a social entrepreneurship startup that sells luxury goods made from yak down. I wondered if the strangely adorable creatures produced tasty beverages as [...]
Photo of the Day: Beijing Roast Duck at Quan Ju De
BEIJING - You bite into the skin of this baby. The universe around you dims; the re nao din of the restaurant fades; there is only this gorgeous, golden piece in your mouth that seems solid until your teeth sink in. It melts. It slides, as sensual and full-bodied as a glass of wine; you gasp. "This is the best thing I've ever eaten," you hear yourself saying.
I <3 Crayfish Pizza
Found in Chengdu. All their restored cultural streets (where you can shop in trendy boutiques and dine in French restos) have a requisite Starbucks. There is a cafe in Tianzifang on trendy Taikang Lu in Shanghai which is populated not by white Macbook-wielding, double espresso-drinking, tight pants-wearing loathsome hipsters, but by yeah, a lot of stuffed animals. That's my friend [...]
Weird Eats: Bull penis and live scorpions. Also, Starbucks coffee.
My sojourn to Beijing was marked mostly by my daily (nay, twice daily) visits to the altar of that is holy in the Middle Kingdom: Starbucks, charmingly translated/transliterated as "星巴克" (xing ba ke). There, I soothed my cultureshock embattled soul with endless tall iced coffees; occasionally, I'd spring for a muffin or biscotti, which tasted excruciatingly American. It was like imbibing a [...]
The perils of being Chinese in China
My China experience was often frustrating. Though I imagined myself to be extremely flexible and open-minded, living for 3 months in a foreign country, despite speaking the language, proved to be a challenge. I am, for all intents and purposes, an American girl. If China taught me nothing else, it's that my "Chineseness" doesn't extend all that far below my skin tone, even if my Mandarin [...]
Shanghai’s Swedish Chef at T8
For City Weekend, I had a great meal at Xintiandi restaurant T8, billed as one of the world's top 50 by Conde Nast in 2003, which is now headed by Swedish Chef Roger Johnsson. We ended up chatting after the meal for quite awhile and talked about the food industry, crazy eats, Anthony Bourdain, and preparations of crayfish, among other things. He's very likable without being over the top, and is [...]
A big bite of Sin
Pick up a copy of the next City Weekend for my "I'll regret this in a few months, but this is still pretty hilarious" appearance in the cover story. The genetically-blessed male specimen on the left is the boyfriend of the editor's friend, who appears as one of my wingwomen (if wingwomen to short Asian girls are always so Amazonian) in the photos. I had no part in writing the story and merely [...]
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