Food, a whole lot of food.

This post is going to be fairly food centric, because admittedly my meals have been the most exciting things to happen to me this week. If you think this sounds like I lead an incredibly dull life, then you are probably right. But hey! I love food, and I think I to a great way to explore a country.

First off Evelina and I showed Linda the beauty of a bowl of ramen. I was feeling quite guilty after my Western leanings the day before, so I had some honey roasted pork ramen, which was amazing. I could only manage half, and had to roll home. It was worth it though. Also Evelina and Linda had never had tea eggs, which are cooked in boiling tea, and a common ingredient in ramen. They don't look the most appetising as they're turned grey, but I think they're pretty good. Linda agreed but Evelina couldn't be persuaded.

Some people crack them slightly to produce a marbled effect.

So that was Tuesday, on Wednesday I tracked down this little Dumpling restaurant. It's in between Wangfujing and Tiananmen, and called 牛哥 饺子 （níuge jiǎozi). There isn't any English on the outside, and it's not in the most touristic area. As a result I may have taken a right when we should have gone left... And we may have been walking in the wrong direction for an extended period of time... We got there in the end however, and it was so worth it! The dumplings were really tasty and at a really good price. We ended up paying 30¥ each for 60 dumplings between us! Awesome. We had roast duck and cucumber - not as great as I was anticipating, too sweet - pork and leek - incredible - and chicken and scallion - also delicious.

The little pot held soy sauce, how cute!

The only issue was when we came to pay, in China one person pays for the meal, they don't tend to split it. This has always been an inconvenience before but we've muddled through. However this time we not only had to break through a language barrier but also an idiocy barrier. I explained to the guy that we wanted to pay separately, in Chinese by the way I didn't even attempt English, he just stared at me with the most gormless expression. I explained again pointing at each of us individually with our money and saying 30¥, 30¥, 30¥. Still the gormless expression remained. At this point his boss interjected - it's a tiny restaurant with 5 tables - she was shouting at him explaining. He still didn't have a clue. Then she told him him to bring the money to her, she sorted it and gave him the change for each of us, one at a time. I just assumed he's related to her, or a bit of a charity case.

So this brings us to day three of our culinary fun! Class on Thursday was a bit full. There were 6 of us, including 2 new people Benjamin - from Brazil, doesn't speak much English - and Patricia, she's Spanish. It was quite frustrating because apart from Evelina, everyone else is a beginner. So I think I shall address that when lessons recommence. However I'm going to try and be more tactful than last time, but I'm not known for it so... 

Anyways, Evelina had been to this really authentic restaurant off to the west of Tiananmen. She took us there, but once again we get slightly lost. Eventually we found it. Evelina wasn't joking it was tiny, and once again no English to be seen. We got stared at as we walked in. 2 blondes and 3 brunettes, not surprising really. We'd already been stared quite a bit. In fact a guy had used the reflection on the subway windows to take a picture of us. Weird. 

We were kind of limited as the menu was full of spicy foods, but we ordered the only 4 things without chilli, alongside these spicy beans for Evelina. 

This was at the end, we did make our way through it quite successfully.

We weren't completely successful, our rice never turned up, and instead of water we got chamomile tea. Overall though not bad going. Everything was super tasty, from the stir-fry to the sweet and sour pork. Definitely worth getting lost for. Evelina however is becoming Chinese, alongside a number of other behaviours she kept putting spicy beans on my plate. I kept giving them back to her but she didn't get that I didn't want them!!! I could forgive the other things, but that was too Chinese. 

Anyways that evening, Evelina and I went out. First we headed to this super swanky rooftop bar, which was beautiful, and gave us great views. I also had my first glass of wine in a month! It was a rosé but far too sweet. So I switched to a Cosmo which was so beautiful. Evelina got chatted up by this Swedish guy, who did something with phones. He was pretty sleazy so we headed off to meet the American guys from last week (sans the crazy nutball). We met them at what is rapidly becoming our go to place, Smugglers what a fine establishment you are. After we headed to Club Latte, which is some big Chinese club where Matt and I looked far too out of place. I did not bring any clothes for swanky clubbing. Matt though had his rucksack on, and his passport and wallet got stolen. Not a great idea to bring them with him, but theoretically we are supposed to carry them everywhere with us. Evelina somehow got us in with these Chinese people who had buckets of Champagne. I felt quite bad bumming off of them all night, but it was Moët. So, what's a girl to do! All in all it was funny night, but Friday was a definite write off. Luckily I don't have to work until 6.