Lamb chops from the excellent Ali’s restaurant in Langmusi.
Lamb chops from the excellent Ali’s restaurant in Langmusi.
Mian pian. Or noodle squares with pork.
Very spicy pickles from the muslim restaurant.
The steps to enjoying a bowl of La Mian.
Hand stretched noodles, toppeed with garlic shoots, leeks, and spicy green and red peppers. Delicious.
In the Summer every restaurant has some seasonal cold dishes. Pictured here are cold fresh hand-stretched noodles.
I don’t know why it took me so long to upload any photos of La Mian. It is my favorite Chinese food and probably the only one I will really miss when I leave. It might not be the most mind blowing dish, but it’s definitely the most reliably good. I think it beats Vietnamese Pho by a mile. The key is the made-fresh-everytime, hand-stretched noodles. Watching the guys roll, stretch, and shake the noodles is an interesting spectacle.
Lamb pies!
A plate of goat testicles. Also some other raw meats in the background to really complete the grossness.
Roujiamo! Little meat sandwiches from China. Though Chinese people seem to somehow think they’re totally different from sandwiches and get confused if you call them that. Sometimes made with Chicken or with added green chilies. Quite variable in meat quality and sanitation standard.
China is not a bread place. There isn’t that much bread, especially along the coast, and when they do have bread it’s usually awful and dry. That’s why I love the bread lady near my house so much. She is friendly and makes awesome bread that can be used to make pita-pocket type sandwiches. It has a bit of salt and cumin powder in it. Just next to her there is a bread man as well.
One of the famous dishes in Xi’an is called yangrou paomo. Basically a lamb soup with some little bread dumplings in it. It tastes quite good and the meat is super tender, but I would like to try it in a different setting. First, if you try it anywhere in the city center you’re going to get gouged on the price (we paid 22 yuan per bowl, when it should totally be about 5). Second, at the place we went to the woman behind the counter was absent-mindedly running her hands through the dried bread pieces and playing with them. Ew.
The weather has gotten hot, so that means the outdoor barbecue restaurants are open. In the center frame you can see our buddy Jia Jia helping us choose some items. Also pictured, skewers, garlic shoots and lamb, eggs, fish, and the more bizarre: goat testicles and insects. There was also some broccoli, breaded eggplant and thin flat-bread that we used to make wraps.
Close-up of the awesome lamb kebabs from the barbecue place.
We recently took a trip to Xian and visited “the Muslim quarter.” It’s pretty touristy and you can basically get the same stuff anywhere in China for a lot cheaper, but the piles of dried fruit and nuts were pretty photogenic. The hot pear juice that the lady in the pink head scarf was selling is delicious and they say it’s good for a cold.
