Our dining table has six chairs. Consequently our apartment came with six plates, six bowls, six forks, etc. We decided that a) six place settings wasn't quite enough and b) since our ayi (maid) cooks Chinese food, Chinese style dishes would be more useful than Western. The Insider's Guide to Beijing (which is proving indispensable) lists, among other things, a hotel/restaurant supply store which it recommends as a good place to get very inexpensive stuff for your kitchen. Saturday we made the trek and filled our cabinets with plenty of cheap Chinese dishes.
"What does all this have to do with bees," you may ask. Well, after purchasing a vast number of dishes (for next to nothing) we went in search of lunch. The first place we wandered into was closed for the between lunch & dinner break (we were searching for lunch at the uncouth hour of 2:15 PM). We stopped in at the next place where they were happy to serve us. After examining the (to me incomprehensible) menu, Ben selected a few items. The waitress gave him a surprised look and explained one of the dishes to him. He looked a little taken aback but said he'd try it (I suppose). It turns out he ordered fried bees...yes, that's right, bees. I'm willing to at least try almost anything...but I draw the line at bugs! Sure enough, he got a large plate of bees lightly battered and fried with chile peppers. I have to confess...seeing all those little bug eyes staring up at me from the plate kind of made me lose my appetite. Ben said they were pretty good though...
To each his own.
Until next time...from Beijing...
Adventures of an American living in China.
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2 comments:
Egads! Fried bees? Well, when I lived in Singapore, I accidentally ate chicken feet (they were ordered along with several other dishes and I mistook them for calamari). Oh well - good source of protein, I suspect. It sounds like a wonderful adventure so far - keep up the bloggin! -Erika
So that's where all the missing bees are going.
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