I have read various funny articles by brilliant writers about being a food writer. I can’t recall exact names, but one brilliant writer had a lengthy discussion with his doctor about his profession and health.
While youth is on my side, I didn’t realise the effects of eating foie gras up to four times a week on certain months till my medical results arrived in my email today—your health is satisfactory.
I was recently back in Singapore and did a full medical check up. My cholestrol is alarmingly high and my body fat percentage increased two fold since my last check up more than a year ago. Other tests also revealed that I’m just this close to becoming a victim of gout! Yikes!
And now, just for fun, try this exercise. I’ve bolded mine. Didn’t do too badly!
Top 100 Chinese Foods to Try Before You Die
1. Almond milk
2. Ants Climbing a Tree (poetic name) – love these crispy stringy potato crisps
3. Asian pear
4. Baby bok choy
5. Baijiu
6. Beef brisket
7. Beggar’s Chicken
8. Bingtang hulu
9. Bitter melonn – hate this cooling “yin” veg, I am assuming it’s synonymous with the bitter gourd
10. Bubble tea – best a la Taiwanese style
11. Buddha’s Delight – 罗汉菜
12. Cantonese roast duck
13. Century egg, or thousand-year egg
14. Cha siu (Cantonese roast pork)
15. Char kway teow
16. Chicken feet
17. Chinese sausage
18. Chow mein
19. Chrysanthemum tea
20. Claypot rice
21. Congee
22. Conpoy (dried scallops)
23. Crab rangoon
24. Dan Dan noodles
25. Dragonfruit
26. Dragon’s Beard candy
27. Dried cuttlefish
28. Drunken chicken
29. Dry-fried green beans
30. Egg drop soup
31. Egg rolls
32. Egg tart, Cantonese or Macanese/Portugese (po tart)
33. Fresh bamboo shoots
34. Fortune cookies – this is not Chinese! It’s a Japanese invention that foreigners bought into!
35. Fried milk
36. Fried rice
37. Gai lan
38. General Tso’s Chicken – this is an American invention, not Chinese!! A Hunanese chef took the vinegar chicken recipe and added sugar to it for the yank palate.
39. Gobi Manchurian
40. Goji berries (Chinese wolfberries)
41. Grass jelly
42. Hainan chicken rice – real one comes from Singapore. hooray!
43. Hand-pulled noodles
44. Har gau (steamed shrimp dumplings in translucent wrappers)
45. Haw flakes
46. Hibiscus tea
47. Hong Kong-style Milk Tea
48. Hot and sour soup
49. Hot Coca-Cola with Ginger – laoshan coca cola should be added to this list. It tastes exactly like vanilla coke, but is apparently brewed with herbs.
50. Hot Pot
51. Iron Goddess tea (Tieguanyin)
52. Jellyfish
53. Kosher Chinese food
54. Kung Pao Chicken
55. Lamb skewers (yangrou chua’r)
56. Lion’s Head meatballs
57. Lomo Saltado – er isn’t this Peruvian not Chinese?
58. Longan fruit
59. Lychee
60. Macaroni in soup with spam
61. Malatang
62. Mantou, especially if fried and dipped in sweetened condensed milk
63. Mapo Tofu
64. Mock meat
65. Mooncake (bonus points for the snow-skin variety)
66. Lor mai gai (chicken and sticky rice in lotus leaf)
67. Pan-fried jiaozi
68. Peking duck
69. Pineapple bun
70. Prawn crackers
71. Pu’er tea
72. Rambutan
73. Red bean in dessert form
74. Red bayberry
75. Red cooked pork
76. Roast pigeon
77. Rose tea
78. Roujiamo
79. Scallion pancake
80. Shaved ice dessert
81. Sesame chicken
82. Sichuan pepper in any dish
83. Sichuan preserved vegetable (zhacai)
84. Silken tofu
85. Soy milk, freshly made
86. Steamed egg custard
87. Stinky tofu
88. Sugar cane juice
89. Sweet and sour pork, chicken, or shrimp
90. Taro
91. Tea eggs
92. Tea-smoked duck
93. Turnip cake (law bok gau)
94. Twice-cooked pork
95. Water chestnut cake (mati gau)
96. Wonton noodle soup
97. Wood ear
98. Xiaolongbao (soup dumplings)
99. Yuanyang (half coffee, half tea, Hong Kong style)
100. Yunnan goat cheese