Before heading off on our holiday, I did wonder how long it would be before I craved eating something “not Chinese”. I was particularly certain that I’d miss the lovely, simple goats cheese and lettuce rolls from Fatto a Mano in Gertrude Street.
Of course, “Chinese food” covers such a range of cuisines. Sure, I enjoyed my first lunch back at work, but we have been to both Hutong and Dumplings Plus for dumpling fixes, Nam Loong for buns and Noodle Kingdom for soup. Re-reading “Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper” also fired us up for some Yangzhou cuisine, so on Sunday we got cooking.
I’ve mentioned my irritation with Lonely Planet’s city guides before. Why, oh why, couldn’t they include a map of the whole country inside the cover? It wouldn’t have added too much distraction to the “city” focus and would have drawn our attention to the fact that Yangzhou is actually quite close to Shanghai. Perhaps we could have tried their famous rice and the Lion’s Head meatballs there! Alas, we were reduced to trawling the internet for a decent recipe for the latter (Fuschia Dunlop kindly includes a recipe for the former).
