eindelijk: 8-8-8

cooks eating by kattebelletje.

De Chinezen hebben lang genoeg gewacht. Ze begonnen al meer dan twee jaar geleden met de Grote Countdown vanaf het Tian'anmenplein, die de dagen telde tot op vandaag. Ik was net op tijd thuis van een weekje weg om hun gigantische show in het Vogelnest live op tv te zien.
Opeens is China heel erg in het nieuws en wordt overal gegoogled naar Chinese recepten. Gisterochtend had De Pers een artikel over de 'nieuwe' Chinese keuken, en 's avonds kwam zelfs het NOS nieuws met een item over de Olympische menu's, iets waar ik in april al een blog post over schreef.

Omdat de zoekfunctie van deze blog soms te wensen overlaat, ik nooit echt een overzicht heb gemaakt, maar ik de afgelopen jaren toch al een behoorlijke verzameling Chinese recepten op dit blog heb verzameld, geef ik hier een overzicht van recepten en verhalen over China. Wel in het engels, maar dat kan geen probleem zijn toch?

• Algemeen:
  * Hier meer over de Chinese spraakverwarring over de Olympische menu's - de hilarische vertalingen van Chinese gerechten die al jarenlang op menukaarten staan en die bij buitenlanders prachtige foto's opleveren
  * Conimex naar Peking : hoe Conimex hun eigen versie van de Chinese [=Indische] keuken in stand probeert te houden, ook nu;
  


• Verzameling Chinese koude voorafjes :
  * Duizendjarige eieren - een hoog griezelgehalte, maar daarna een acquired taste
  * Salade met reepjes tofu, sesamolie en koriander als het zomerweer is
  * Chinese geplette radijsjessalade met link naar video
  * Chinese komkommer in het [zoet] zuur knapperig voorafje, overal in China te bestellen
  


• Chinese klassiekers:
  * Mapo tofu - pikant gerecht van tofu met gehakt uit de Sichuankeuken
  * Ganbian sijidou: drooggebakken sperciebonen, Sichuan style - boontjes, gedroogde garnalen en gehakt
  * Terug-in-de-pan vlees [twice cooked pork] (met video) - speklapjes met knoflook en lenteuitjes
  * Gongbao chicken [Chicken Kung pao], kip met nootjes
  * Fotoinstructie op Flickr : hoe maak ik Gongbao Chicken
  * Bangbang chicken [Kip klopklop] - koude kipreepjes met sojasaus en sesamolie
  * Aubergine met sichuanpeper-zout gefrituurde schijfjes met dip
  * Mongoolse hotpot (Chinese fondue) klassieker, een ouwetje al


• Vis & vlees:
  * Gestoomde zalm op z'n Chinees
  * Kabeljauw met zwarte boontjes makkelijk, snel en lekker
  * Garnalen uit de wok (met video)
  * Reepjes varkensvlees met knoflookspruiten
  


• Groente:
  * Gebakken aardappelsprietsjes bijzondere manier om aardappels te eten
  * Koreaanse salade knapperige zomersalade met zoet-zure smaken
  * Jiaobai: exotische groente in de Chinese supermarkt
  * Eten Chinezen tulpen? : eetbare lelies
  * Bloemkool met garnalen, simpele stir-fry
  * Zelf rode pepertjes inleggen [1] en [2]


• Dumplings en noedels:
  * Olympische dumplings de lekkerste kant-en-klare dumplings uit de supermarkt
  * Vegetarische dumplings vulling voor jiaozi
  * Jiaozi [Chinese dumplings] met nieuwjaar
  * Pannenplakkers [potstickers guotie, gyoza] gebakken dumplings
  *Yinyin-saus: het lekkerste sausje voor dumplings
  * Koude Sichuan noedels - klassieke favoriet
  * Dandan noedels (met video)
  * Xiaolongbao [kleine gestoomde Shanghaidumplings]
  *Baozi [Chinese bapao's]
  

Voor wie meer wil weten over de Chinese keuken en Chinees koken, kijk ook op Flickr bij mijn laatste verzameling eetfoto's uit China en mijn sets instructiefoto's, hoe maak ik... Jiaozi, Chinese dumpings; Mapo tofu; chili-olie; Hagau - dimsums met garnalenvulling; hoe vouw ik een wonton; Chicken Gongbao; Bangbang chicken; Twice-cooked pork en nog heel wat andere kookinstructies. Veel plezier ermee!

Conimex Beijing ad

Conimex Beijing by kattebelletje.

Nooooooo, you can't be serious!!!! I thought, wachting the newest tv-ad for the well-known brand of Conimex (Unilever), a huge producer of Asian convenience foods in the Netherlands. This brand has been around locally since the 1950s, when Conimex started to cater for the growing demand in ingredients for the cuisine of the former colony of Indonesia. Conimex has been selling Indonesian ground spices in small jars, spice mixtures (bumbus) and sweet soy sauces (kecap) for decades now, but have recently strengthened their share of the Dutch market by selling convenience packets of Indian, Malay, or otherwise Asian flavorings, like sauce mixes for stir-frying and new inventions for cooking, like 'wok oil'.

The newest Conimex ad features two men - probably famous Dutch sportsmen (although I don't who they are) roaming about Beijing for the Olympics. The main sports guy walks on Tian'anmen square, while the voice over says : "As a sportsman, eating well is really important. That's why I buy fresh produce at the local market."

We see him heading to this farmer's market, where there are red lanterns hanging from the ceiling, and red, green and yellow Dutch glasshouse peppers on display. Our sportsman is bargaining hard for one cauliflower (a true Dutch vegetable), pays 5 yuan for it, gets himself some spring onions, and hurries home to his Beijing appartment with his shopping bag.

When he passes a rickshaw puller enjoying a bowl of noodles, the sportman says: " They are, like us, crazy about Chinese food, but ... I'd rather cook it by myself! That's why I take as much as I can from Holland, including Conimex". He comes home, plonks his bags in the kitchen, greets the second (sports)man sitting on a couch reading the paper, then opens up the pantry, takes out a packet of ready-to-wok rice, a packet of sweet-and-sour sauce, and starts to chop up the red bell pepper on a chopping board.

He heats a wok, and in 5 seconds, he mixes the pepper and chicken (?) with the cooked rice (the cauliflower and spring onions have disappeared), puts in green peas, pours a sweet and sticky looking sauce over his fried rice, and takes two flat plates to the couch where he and his friend enjoy the view of the new 'bird's nest' stadium. He sighs happily and says: "Just like home, but don't forget: they use chopsticks here..."

I was really jumping up and down in front of my tv screen at this moment. Nooo nooo nonooooo !!! You stupid man! How can you take your own bloody rice from Holland and your sweet and sour sauce, which have nothing to do with Beijing, and cook this plainest of Chinese foods, FRIED RICE for God's sake!, by yourself, while on the streets of Beijing, everywhere, at every street corner, in every restaurant, for a price way cheaper than your own imported fake Dutch package stuff, you will eat more delicious food than the two of you will ever dream to have when you insist on 'cooking' in your appartment?

The commercial is, however, well made, and quite funny in its stupid way. But I don't think there is any hope for Dutch Chinese cooking. Want to have a look yourself ? The Conimex ad is on YouTube.

Olympic menu

Chicken cartilage
Originally uploaded by Box of Badgers.

There have been very hilarious moments when I discovered the bulk of photos tagged Chinglish in Flickr. The Chinese, as well as the Japanese, have the most wonderful translations when it comes to English. Menus are notorious for their strange translations. And it hits the customers hardest when they sit down nervously in a non-English-speaking environment, and are handed out a piece of smudgy paper inside a plastic sheet, with (relief!) a Roman alphabet instead of these Chinese scribbles.

Until you start reading. It doesn't make sense at all! And perhaps you haven't even stopped laughing after ordering the first round of beers! Just have a look here for some fine examples.

The Chinese have become aware of the bad impression their linguistically challenged countrymen are making on tourists. Or, even worse, the impression their poorly translated menus might make on future tourists, who are all traveling to Beijing for the Olympics.

So, the City of Beijing decided to make a list of standard menu items, plus an official translation into English. This list covers the translations of 2753 dishes and drinks, and is supposed to be issued to all restaurants in Beijing before August. It was all in the news last January, which made me search the web extensively, but while I found many appearances of the fact that there existed such a list, the real list didn't show up that quickly.

Finally, I found it last weekend in a (final?) draft from the Beijing Tourism Bureau (click here for zip file). All dishes are neatly numbered, like in a Chinese restaurant. They sure had a lot of work on this menu, and, it must be said, it looks quite OK. Translating menus is surely no easy job, and it is funny even to screen the list for what is served in restaurants. I mean, would you expect Pan-Fried Chicken Wings in Coca-Cola Sauce [449] ?

Some accepted translations have dissappeared: the century eggs (1000-year old eggs) are called preserved eggs, and chaxiu (charsiu) buns are now just BBQ pork buns on the menu [1706]. Other Chinese spellings are introduced on the menu, because they are intranslatable, like jiaozi (Chinese dumplings); shaomai (small dimsums filled with pork), and guotie (fried Chinese dumplings, gyoza in Japanese). There are many snacks , starting from number 1686.

No one escapes the Chinese snack translation trap, because bun is used to either mean a filled or non-filled dough-like food, and the word dumpling coveres a great variety of snacks. I found one typo in the list (Red-Cooked Chicken with Tea Falvor [527]) , but that is nothing compared to the old menus!
Ordering "shredded pork sauteed with spicy garlic sauce" sounds much more mouth-watering than "fragrant shredded meat in fish" or "fuck the fragrant chicken cartilage" don't you think?

Still, I will miss those menus badly. They make eating out a delight, and then we haven't talked about the food yet ! We can always escape and go somewhere outside Beijing, where I am sure there will be Chinglish menus for many years to come.