Dog Don't Care

Day two in Tianjin China...

After spending most of the day with my wife's college-mates wandering the shopping district ducking in and out of different shopping establishments to avoid the biting cold of the winter breeze, we meet up with the in-laws for dinner at 狗不理(Gou Bu Li; Literally translated Dog Don't Care) . This is what we ordered:

• 传统猪肉包子 (Traditional Pork steam buns)
• 三鲜包子 (Pork, sea cucumber, and shrimp steamed buns)
• 蟹黄包子 (Crab meat steam buns)
• 野菜包子 (Wild herbs steam buns)
• 百年酱肉包子 (Hundred years marinated pork steam buns)
• 红烧驮掌 (Braised Camel Paw)
• 蝴蝶鳝鱼 (Butterfly Eel)
• 龙井牛蛙 (Dragon Well Bull Frog)
  

Gou Buli steam bun is one of the local speciality of Tianjin. It stands out from other steam buns because the stuffing is particularly smooth and oily and the dough is not fully leavened. This place is a bit of a tourist trap, but I'm a tourist and I'm told by everyone that if you go to Tianjin you have to try its Gou Buli steamed buns. That I did, it is very good, but quite pricey. The traditional pork steam bun was my favorite flavor.

The other dishes were quite interesting. Take the Braised Camel Paw - I didn't even know camel was edible. It's actually very soft, smooth, and silky. If you enjoy pig knuckles or pig feet, you will definitely enjoy camel paw. Yeah, I know how strange that sounds. Just trust me. It's good.

The eel and bull frog I've had before. It's my understanding that you can't get fresh eel in the States so I knew I was going to order something with eel while in China. The Butterfly eel dish is very similar to the Unagi you find at a Japanese restaurant. The difference is it's not sweet like its Japanese counterpart. The Dragon Well Bull frog is a twist on a traditional Zhe Jiang dish called Dragon Well Shrimp. It's good, but I still prefer the Dragon Well Shrimp.

Overall the experience at Gou Buli was enjoyable. It's one of those you must do it once restaurant because it's so famous.

Our second dinner in Tianjin has made one thing very apparent to me - Chinese people eat every animal under the sun. In the two days I've been here I've eaten donkey and camel - things that I didn't think was edible. I've still got 2.5 more weeks here, who knows what else I'm going to try...

For an explanation of why this restaurant is called 狗不理 (Dog Don't Care) go to http://www.tjgoubuli.com/ and read it for yourself.

More Dumplings Than You Can Shake A Pair Of Chopsticks At

Sorry for the long layoff. I had a bit of the blogger's block (I'm too busy to blog on the consistent basis). Anyways I'm reinvigorated and reinspired because I'm in Tianjin China; a 2-hour bus ride southeast of Beijing.

Day one - We went to a place called 百饺园(Ba Jiao Yuan; Literally translated as hundred dumpling garden). There couldn't be a better place for our first dinner in this part of China. This restaurant has a seemingly endless variety of dumplings to choose from. This was what we ordered:

• 五香驴肉饺子 (Donkey Meat Dumpling)
  
  
  
• 红籽银鱼饺子 (Red Fish Roe and SilverFish Dumpling)
  
  
  
• 蟹上皇饺子 (Crab Roe and Crab Meat Dumpling)
  
  
  
• 羊肉黄瓜饺子 (Lamb and Cucumber Dumpling)
  
  
  
• 鸭肉香菇饺子 (Duck and Mushroom Dumpling)
  
  
  
• 津味素饺子 (TianjinVegetarian Dumpling)

That's no typo - we ate donkey meat. "Getting some ass" has a totally different meaning in this place.

Each of the dumpling dishes are simply served on a plate. No frills just dumplings. Each order has about 5-7 pieces. There is a window from the seating area into the kitchen that shows 10-12 chefs preparing dumplings. Everything is freshly made.

Bai Jiao Yuan, hands-down, has the best dumpling I've ever had. If you're ever in Beijing or Tianjin you must make a stop at this place. Oh god, I died and went to dumpling heaven. There's other stuff on the menu, but why bother. It's a like going to a burger joint and ordering a salad. That's just all sorts of wrong bro. Do the right thing and DO THE DUMPLING!

After we finished dinner, my mother-in-law asked me which flavor of dumpling was my favorite. This was unexpectedly difficult to answer because I thoroughly enjoyed all of them, but if I had to choose - it would be the donkey dumpling. I've never had donkey meat before and I never thought it would taste so good. It is in fact very very tasty. It actually taste a bit like mutton. If you think about it that's not too surprising. I'd never thought I'd say it, but it's true Ma, I like eating ass.

Contact Information

Name: 百饺园
Address: 天津市南开区长江道23号
Tel: 022-23719000

Bill Gates retires as CEO from Microsoft

Here's a hilarious video on Bill Gates' last day at Microsoft:

Early Candidate for 2008 Darwin Award

I couldn't believe it when I saw this picture. If it's not a fake, then these folks are definitely candidates for 2008 Darwin award:

Yet another "We didn't start the fire" spoof

Here's yet another spoof based on the "We didn't start the fire" song by Billy Joel. This one seemed appropriate since it's a comedic review of year 2007.

Ooey Gooey Pumpkin Butter Cakes

October through December is great time for enjoying food. The holiday spirit kicks in and there's always someone making something special and sharing it with everyone. Jason, my good friend, and his wife recently made a dessert they refer to as "Ooey Gooey Pumpkin Butter Cakes" - apparently they make this every year during the holidays. I've never had it before since I'm not a fan of anything with pumpkins in it, but Jason's description of this dessert made me check my disdain of pumpkins. I gave it a try and all I can say is, "Thank you Jason! Can I have seconds, thirds, and fourths please?"

So I had to ask for the recipe thinking it was some super-secret family recipe. Well, it wasn't - he just sent me a link to the recipe at Food Network. God, writing about this dessert really makes me hungry...

Wife, I'm itching for something good. I busy blogging and I demand that you make me some Ooey Gooey Pumpkin Butter Cakes.

Umm, let me re-phrase that...

Honey, my friend's wife just gave me this great recipe for Ooey Gooey Pumpkin Butter Cakes. Maybe we can spend some quality time together making it this weekend? Here's the url to the recipe:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_20677,00.html

Our 24 Hour Christmas Special

My wife and I didn't have much planned for ourselves this Christmas. We were following whatever plans our relatives had. Once we got that out of the way we realized we didn't have all that much to do. It's Christmas Eve so we though maybe we can do some special. Maybe go Salsa dancing or catch a movie, but none of that felt right so we decided to keep it simple and stay home.

We went to our neighborhood Blockbuster to rent the first 3 discs of 24's season 6 and picked up a late-night snack at Jack In The Box. After we got home, my wife warmed up some chicken soup and I opened up a couple of boxes of chocolate truffles for the 24 marathon that we were about to embark on.

So there we were, just the 2 of us, at home on Christmas Eve huddled together on our couch watching 24. Accompanying us are a steak and egg breakfast burrito combo from Jack In The Box, some homemade chicken soup, and a good amount of Lindt and Godiva chocolate truffles. As it turns out, season 6 was extremely captivating. We ended up staying up all night watching all the DVDs we rented and finishing up all the food except for the truffles. We didn't go to bed until pretty close to sunrise on Christmas morning. We slept just enough to give ourselves enough energy to rent the last set of DVDs for season 6 and finish watching them before Christmas day was over.

Sometimes the special moments are the simplest. My wife and I (appropriately enough) for 24 hours felt like teenagers - free from any of our regularly responsibilities completely captivated by the moment. This sounds cheesy, but true - Saint Nick was real for us this Christmas. He gave us a very special Christmas that both of us will cherish for years to come.