A taste of Chiuchow (or Teochew) cuisine

Chiuchow or Teochew cuisine was the food of my ancestors although we only had it occasionally when growing up and always at restaurants because my mother was not from that area of China. It was therefore not household food for me as a child and as an adult it became just one of many regional Chinese cuisines that we might try if friends suggested it but ultimately we always go back to Cantonese cuisine which is more like "home".

Recently we had a private dining experience with chiuchow cuisine and I have a better understanding of it. The surprising thing is, it is in the dining room of a retirement residence!  Here is the description from Wikipaedia: "Teochew cuisine is well known for its seafood and vegetarian dishes. Its use of flavouring is much less heavy-handed than most other Chinese cuisines and depends much on the freshness and quality of the ingredients for taste and flavour. As a delicate cuisine, oil is not often used in large quantities and there is a relatively heavy emphasis on poaching, steaming and braising, as well as the common Chinese method of stir-frying".  That explained why it was chosen as the cuisine of choice for a retirement residence and over dinner, I found that it is quite an accurate description.

We had our special dinner at the Vintage Garden Dining Room 葡萄園會所 - prepared by the team led by chef Franky Yeung who is considered one of the top 10 celebrity chefs in Canada. The 10 course banquet was sumptuous but not overwhelming as the food is generally light and not fatty. Decoration of the plates were impressive but I was particularly impressed by the quality of the food. 

  Appetizers - tofu stuffed with shrimp and fish paste, shrimp, grilled chicken                        潮洲四弍拼盤

    Extra delicious duck soup with salted lemon and shitake                                                                       咸檸檬炖鴨

This was what was in the soup

Haven't had this in a long time - shrimp and bamboo shoot pouches in egg-white wrap - could have used some mushrooms in it to improve texture      䔵花石榴球

Bacon-wrapped scallop rolls served on snow pea shoots 彩帶玉龍卷 - love the contrasting textures!

Tea-smoked duck 茶熏鴨

This is the most unusual and interesting dish with vegetarian centre (different kinds of fungi) inside a winter melon bowl but surrounded by braised pork belly on the outside!      白玉藏珍寶

Vegetarian abalone with fried vermicelli 素鮑魚撈米粉 - this one looked good and I really like the crunchy vermicelli.  The fake abalone looked good but texture could be improved.

Refreshing dessert with green bean and tapioca 清心丸綠豆爽  and one that I didn't take a photo of, sweet mashed taro 福菓芋泥

Enjoyed the dinner very much and no ill effects afterwards even though it was a big meal!

Seafood in Patagonia

When I first started thinking about food in Argentina, I was a little concerned that we would be stuck with beef for the three weeks we were there as that seemed to be everyone's "must-eat" recommendation - and they were probably right, one has got to try it. So it was with relief that we saw a selection of river fish on the menu when we were in Puerto Iguazu even though we are always a little leery when trying fish in a new restaurant. We took a risk and were glad we did.

We tried Suribi (a type of catfish) and Pacu (a large freshwater fish), both river fishes.  Grilled at La Rueda, both were delicious, probably because they were fresh - we must be close to the river!  Then as we headed into Patagonia, we tried trout in Bariloche and a most delicious Hake fish at lunch in Puella, in the midst of our Andean Lakes Crossing. It was like a ray of sunshine in our drizzly crossing. The Hake is related to the cod with firm but tender white meat. I like it better than cod but then it could be the way it was cooked.

Pacu and suribi at La Rueda

The Hake in the Puella Hotel restaurant

When we got to Puerto Varas in Chile, we were pleasantly surprised by the Conger eel. It is not an actual eel, apparently, and certainly did not taste like one. It had a nice white fish consistency and texture. There were always salmon on the menu but with so much salmon at home, we did not want to waste our tasting opportunities on salmon - afterall how different could it taste from one end of the Americas to the other? I did try a small piece off our guides' plate just to confirm my guess. We had the rollizo (rockfish) instead and it was tasty, very well-prepared served on a warm quinoa salad.

Conger eel in the Mirador del Lago, Puerto Varas, Chile

Rollizo in La Jardinera, Puerto Varas, Chile

The high points of our trip to Ushuaia, other than the penguins, were our encounters with Southern King Crab and Merluzza Negra. We were lucky to have met with fellow travellers who were equally keen on food and had actually researched where to eat king crab before they left home. They were thrilled when it was the same restaurant our guide took us to - El Viejo Marino. We got to choose our own crab, big enough to share between two, very tasty and very reasonably priced. We could have gone back for a second meal the following day. But I was glad I did my homework this time - we have to try the Merluzza Negra in Ushuaia! And was I ever glad we did!

Southern King crab

We made sure we picked a restaurant that had merluzza negra (Patagonian toothfish or Chilean Seabass) on the menu - Maria Lola Resto. It must have been the sweetest fish I had ever tasted in my life, no exaggeration. I'm not a great lover of fish but this one really beat everything I have ever tried - even the tender lamb I also ordered paled beside it and I am a great lover of lamb. The fresh frozen Chilean sea bass we could get in Toronto is tasty, but not like this. The chef cooked it to perfection and of course, we were eating the fish closest to its source - Ushuaia being at "the end of the world"...

Merluzza negra - served with shrimp, squid and crab legs, but who needs those!

 

 

In all, Patagonia surprised me with its abundance of delicious food and expert chefs - totally not what I had expected in these small towns in the wilderness! Good job!
 

Argentinian Carne

You can't go wrong with beef in Argentina - whether you go to the best restaurants or eat at the roadside.  The beef is tasty and tender. There is no reason to eat a hamburger in Argentina because the real meat is so tender there is no need to grind it or chop it up.  In the two weeks we spent in the country, whether we paid 160 pesos ($10US) for a lunch beef sandwich by the roadside or 700 pesos ($45US) for the most tender cut in a high end restaurant, we know we would get tender beef. It is the safest choice when in doubt. Chicken could be tasteless or even tough, pork could be chewy (we had to send one order back to the kitchen at a German beer place in Bariloche) - but not the beef. It's quite amazing!  It is also interesting that while "carne" translates as "meat", when the Argentine referred to "carne", they invariably were talking about beef.

Bife de lomo or tenderloin is generally the priciest and most tender cut although I've been told different restaurants translate it differently. We tried it our first night in Iguazu Falls in Aqua, where it was actually called filet mignon on the menu; in Buenos Aires at a parilla (grill), they called it bife de lomo - both were tasty and tender; huge too, big enough for two of us.  We have also tried the rib steak - it too was very tender with higher fat content. 

There were parillas and asados - parilla is where the meat was grilled and asado is like a barbeque where the whole side was cooked over an open fire. I tried cordero (lamb), where they give you different cuts on the same order - it was tender and flavorful. The short ribs asado was not as tender but still flavorful.  There were various cuts and organ parts of the beef in the asado but dinner is usually so late, one can only eat so much. After gorging ourselves on meat for a few meals, we switched to seafood, which I will talk about in the next post.

Aqua called it "filet mignon" possibly because it's considered a fine dining restaurant but it looked the same as the Bife de lomo below from the Buenos Aires Grill in Recoleta.  May be too big, really for filet mignon, but certainly tenderloin.

And this is rib eye steak - with an egg on top! (homestyle cooking at Esquina Varela Restaurant, El Calafate)

Short rib asado - I think I was too keen on my lamb asado, forgot to take a picture of it!

All asado restaurants have this for show either outside or inside the restaurant.  This one was in La Tablita, El Calafate. Locals came here too and the place was packed on a week night at 10pm

And of course we had a most delicious beef sandwich (also big enough to share) at this roadside place "El Titanic de Homero" in Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires

Next post: Seafood!