Trying to get home.

It is difficult to explain the incredible traffic we have here in Shanghai.  While we were heading home and driving on the correct side of the road this mass of cars decided to get across the street.  It was an onslaught of vehicles.

I was trying to make Palacsinta

Saturday morning I found myself bending over and picking up some small bit of thread, dirt, speck of something on the floor just like my Nagymama use to do and this thought of my Nagymama inspired me to make some palacsinta.  I know, what a weird way to get to this thought.

So I looked up the recipe online and whipped up a batch.  Unfortunately they ended up resembling  french crepes instead of my Nagymama's palacsinta. 

 Perhaps my pan was too small? Or the batter to thin? I just don't know.

 I had some canned peaches which I warmed up with silvered almonds and put them inside the palacsina/french crepe.

They tasted good but not like Nagymama's.  Oh well. It was nice to think about her while making this sweet treat.

Hot Pot Restaurant - Hai Di Lao

This great time, described below, occurred in December 2011 when TJ and Kristen came to visit us in Shanghai.

One of TJ's and Kristen's favorite meals in China is hot pot, and on a cold winter day it certainly hits the spot!  I have eaten at a number of different hot pot restaurants but this chain restaurant, originally from the Sichuan Province, is my favorite.  It's consistent, clean and affordable. (Uh, yes, that's TJ in glasses, newly purchased here in Shanghai.)

The process from start to finish is entertaining as well as nourishing and comforting. First you gather around a table that has a well in the center.  This is where the soup will go.  There is a heating element in the bottom of this well and a container is placed inside the well, on top of the heating element. We chose a combination of soups - a clear mushroom broth and a hot and spicy broth.  The soups are brought out and the spicy soup is mixed at the table.

 Here are the soups, the right is the mushroom and the left will be the spicy, right now it's just a clear vegetable broth.

 The chef opens a bag with the hot spicy mixture - chili oil, hot numbing peppercorns from the Sichuan Province, and other spicy red peppers.

 He pours in the mixture to the clear base and voila (!), hot spicy soup.

 As an entertainment treat, as well as to add some yummy noodles to the soup I ordered the "Kung Fu" noodles.  A waiter comes to your table and takes a bit of noodle dough, stretches it and begins twirling it around, using this method to stretch the noodle.  It's a bit tricky, as the noodle gets longer it has more opportunity to  hit the dirty floor.  Our guy had to use three bits of dough to get our order stretched and into the pot.  The first two hit the floor and he had to toss those away.

 On our table you can also see the items we ordered to throw into the soup.

Spinach, cauliflower, mushrooms and sliced beef and mutton. Oh and beer, lots of beer, not for the hot pot, for us!

A very satisfying meal!

Another trip to Monganshan Mountain - the bamboo forest

This post should have been posted in Oct 2011 - sorry for the delay.

We began the trip on a bus! One of the most popular ways to travel in China! Well, ok so our destination was only 31/2 hours away and bus is the most direct way to the Bamboo forest.  Tony's company, MWV, was having a team building trip and since I am the wife of the MD (Managing Director of China),                  I was also invited. (ah the perks!)

We gathered at 8:30am and hopped on the bus, our first stop a nearby lake (3 hour ride) for lunch and a boat ride.

I think this guy was one of the chefs in the kitchen.

All of us settling in for a nice lunch.

A variety of food was served, some seafood and some not. A very nice chicken soup and (seperately) a fish soup were part of the meal and I enjoyed both.  I did have to poke around to find the undesireable breast meat.  The Chinese do not like the tough white meat so there was plently for me!  There were 3 westerners on this trip. Tony, Julie and me. Julie is a young American gal who works at MWV here in Shanghai.

Spicey fish soup.

Chinese escargot......snails in a nice smokey sauce.  The snail is not even worth trying to suck out of it's tiny shell but the sauce over the rice is tasty.

The chicken soup, yes they cook it with the feet and all!  Well actually I did not see the beak and head so maybe no head.   The broth and breast meat were delicious, probably the best chicken soup I have had in a long time in China.  Usually it's so overloaded with MSG that I don't care for the taste.

Our view from the dining room.

The 'house" boat we were going to take to go around the lake, there are two here.

Inside the boat.

Our gang!

Enjoying the view with Julie.  The water was filthy brown. 

This is pretty neat, the lake is man made so this forest got "swamped" but seemed to have survived and thrived.  I think it is quite beautiful sprouting up from the lake.

A temple and small town.  Looks old but was created just for tourists who visit the lake.

This looks like a busy pedestrian street but it's really all of the MWV people strolling along, if we weren't here there would be no one else around.  Most of the shops were closed up.

This was lovely, an artist plying his craft.

Pickled snake for sale, what one does with it once you have gotten it home is beyond me.

Nice.

As usual, working......I like to image that the sign next to him says, no phones or texting allowed in this fine and hallowed temple.  Now THAT would be funny. 

Another way to ride the lake, by bamboo raft.

And finally a Bamboo forest.

There is always someone in attendence 'guarding' or watching out for .....something.  I see the guards' chair but I never did get a glimpse of him.  Maybe they are worried a tourist will take off with a tree?

These ladies were doing a bit of gambling. A nice way to spend the afternoon.

After the lake visit we got on the bus and began heading to the top of the Bamboo Mountain. We were nearly there and encountered this little situation, it was a real local moment.  On the road to the hotel we came to a 20 minute stop for no apparent reason.  Finally some of us got out of the bus to see what was going on.  Two guys were having a shouting match about who should have pulled over first on the narrow road.  For the record, the two cars had already passed each other and there was no obvious problem, they just wanted to yell at each other and get their frustrations out....I guess.  No mind to anyone who was on their way somewhere. The line of cars stopped had to be 15 including our 2 buses.  And it seemed everyone was bored so the neighbors come out to watch the ruckus with no thought to the fact that perhaps they could move it off the street and let the others get on their way.  Oh, I was told that one guy was swinging a hammer at one point but I missed that; I wonder, was the hammer in the trunk of the car or does he keep it next to him on the seat for moments like this?

Up the mountian all covered in bamboo trees.

Our room, which had bugs, and the bed was as hard as it looks in the picture. The Chinese like a good firm board to sleep on.  I was a good sport that night, when one large bug crawled on me I just grabed at it and flung it across the room, heard him "crash" against the wall and went back to sleep. Now you understand the perks I was telling you about!

Overall, it was nice to get out of Shanghai and breath some fresh air and hike around the mountian.  The bus trip takes 4 hours door to door and that long trip makes it hard to want to come back.  I have been twice now, prior to this trip I took a long day trip in 2009 just to hike for a couple of hours.