Dogalicious
Trip Start
May 22, 2005
1
78
107
Trip End
Jan 22, 2006
Kunming,
China
Friday, November 4, 2005
In Kunming we had lots of culinary highlights. We will go into great detail.
Plate of Deep Fried Bugs
Alex brought us to sample Kunming's famous mushroom hot pot. The broth for this hot pot is a delicious bubbling concoction made from 30 varieties of mushroom. Paul, overcome with hunger, was so eager to start devouring that he came dangerously close to eating the wild mushrooms before the waitress was able to remove the poisonous froth. This earned Paul a sharp rebuke from the concerned server and his wife. After the poison was removed, the wonderful hot pot was enjoyed by all.
Dog is a well known delicacy in Kunming. Hot pot restaurants advertise this specialty with happy depictions of golden retrievers painted on the outside of their establishments. When in Rome . . . We went old school and found a street stall that served a steaming bowl of dog noodles for 5 yuan (75 cents). We are sorry-dog is tasty.
In the middle of cosmopolitan Kunming, there is an enormous food court which serves every food imaginable and unimaginable. Upon entering this "cathedral" dedicated to the "worship" of Chinese cuisine, animated restaurateurs accost you from all sides insisting that their competitors serve garbage while they serve culinary magic. Mel's parents skillfully steered us through the throngs
Grubalicious
. There was so much selection and choice we didn't know what to sample. We finally settled on a stall that had dishes of bugs and other indescribable meats displayed in the window. We tucked into deep fried bugs (crunchy and pretty bland), rice steamed in bamboo, dog hot pot and various delicious desserts. So much food, so little space.Yunnan Province is famous for its delicious and beautiful fruit. One of our road side stops was at a farmers market. We purchased some gorgeous looking pears and in our greediness bought way too much. We ended up eating pears for days.
Another Kunming specialty that we sampled was the crossing bridge rice noodles. To prepare the dish the servers place a bowl of extremely hot boiling soup in front of you (which strangely doesn't steam or bubble) in which they prepare the noodles and the other accompaniments. Apparently the dish was the invention of a dutiful Chinese wife whose husband had sequestered himself in the neighbouring town to study for the Confucian exams. In order to keep him well nourished the wife crossed the bridge that separated the two towns daily in order to bring him dinner. To keep the noodles firm and tasty she devised the method of keeping all the ingredients separate until right before eating.
Kunming is also famous for its puerh tea. We visited the National Tea Institute where they showed us how this tea is carefully prepared and aged in giant blocks. The older the tea, the better and more complex the taste. We sampled exotically flavoured tea that was over 40 years old. Apparently the puerh tea they serve at the local dim sum joint is really mud water
Don't Get that Caught in Your Teeth
. We left with a new appreciation for the art of tea.We did break long enough from eating to see some of the sights around Kunming. We visited the flower and bird market-a noisy busy place where vendors sell everything from live birds to pet cats which they will wash for you in a bucket before you take them home. At the market we also saw groups of men participating in cricket fighting. No, the men weren't fighting the crickets-they were pitting them against each other.
The only highway in Yunnan Province, Highway 321, which replaced the infamous Burma Road, brought us to the Stone Forest. The "forest" is actually 350 square kilometres of limestone structures that resemble huge trees. The site is 200 million years old and was once a seabed that rose up due to the earth's movements. It was very impressive, though the Chinese take on tourist sites is always to go over the top and to present it in a sort of strange Disney like setting. Consequently, some of the stones were painted and marked in bright colours and Alex kept insisting that certain structures looked exactly like elephants and other animals.
The Burma Road also took us to the Jiu Xiang Scenic Area where the Pearl River has carved out the limestone into some spectacular caves. In these dark caves, strange animals, such as the world's longest blind fish (14 cm), live. Again however, the authorities had made a point to light up the naturally stunning caves in Christmas colours-a little distracting. We also got a chance to see the Golden Temple built by the warrior dude Wu Sangui (how come nobody ever builds things like the Pale Grey Temple?).
On an aside, while in Kunming we noticed that one young man's job was to pull a metal ramp along the curb to allow cars to park on the sidewalk for tips. That is one tough job which makes billable hours seem like a joke.
