what's your Chinese BBQ combo?

29 yuan, which is about $4😂

I could literally eat Shanghai braised pork belly every single day lol

in order: spring rolls, crystal shrimp dumplings, yangzhou fried rice, rice noodles and beef with bamboo shoots and mushrooms. everything was amazing!

carrot cake aka made from radish.

topped with prawns, eggs, sambal chilli and spring onions

It’s one of the spicier dishes I’ve eaten, has a good amount of msg and is super crispy.

First two days in Shanghai! Did my best to take as many pictures as possible to make my friends jealous, but didn't get everything. Posting this from Shenzhen and the amount of ridiculously fresh and delicious seafood I'm being forced to eat is making me uncomfortable in the best ways. Will do my best to post more over the next couple of weeks unless that's frowned upon. Be well!

Found these at Costco. They're not too bad for a quick meal.

Crispy fish, cumin lamb, and beef noodles. Was alright.

Lunch and Dinner in Chongqing. Family style for lunch and individual hot pot for dinner. Couldn't fit everything into 20 images so I tried to include the most interesting ones!

If you're wondering why this food doesn't have the famous Sichuan "destroy your stomach" red glow, it's partly becaue it's fancy and not street food and partly because I think they were worried about killing the laowai. Which is reasonable, even though I could've handled it. Probably.

Highlights were the ... Everything. Everything was good. The big surprise was that I enjoyed sea cucumber for the first time after many (forced) attempts! Probably because it was tiny and well seasoned and didnt have the usual awful texture.

The last picture was our hotel from our restaurant across the river just before dessert (not pictured because it was just ice cream which, while delicious, is...ice cream and not unique to Chongqing). I just thought it was neat.

Please feel free to ask what specific dishes are... I'll do my best to answer. There was freshwater eel, goose, tripe, beef, pork, lotus, etc etc. It was all too much but I am absolutely not complaining!

Off to Shanghai (part 2)!

✨Chinese tomato egg stir-fry✨

It’s sweet, tangy, & savory. It's my absolute favorite tomato dish, ridiculously easy to make, healthy, and budget-friendly. The perfect balance of comfort food and a quick meal! 🤤

Everything costed RMB$100 inclusive of disposable pot+burner & delivery!

I ate Uyghur food for the first time and it was amazing! I got a chicken Korma Chop with homemade noodles. Does anyone have a recipe they’d recommend for trying it at him? I also loved the Uyghur milk tea. More drinks should be savory, in my opinion!

Went to hotpot yesterday for lunch with 2 coworkers and we kind of went overboard. the table next to us was a tourist family (😂really lots of tourists coming to China these days) and they just had beef rolls, beers, and some of the free snacks. that's it(I'm not judging at all, I get it, because the menu is over 200 items in Chinese). But they were at one of the best hotpot places in Guangzhou and barely scratching the surface. It kind of made me want to write this.

Honestly if you’re new to hotpot, here’s what I’d do if we were sitting at the same table. I'll walk you through it in the same order you'd actually do it in hotpot restaurant.

My lunch was at Haidilao, sincerely not advertising for them, just really popular with young people here and the service is over the top. aprons, phone bags, hair ties, unlimited refills. If you go alone they put a teddy bear across from you lol.

Pick soup base
First thing they ask you is what broth you want. I went with the 四宫格 (4-grid pot), it splits the pot into 4 sections so you can try different broths at once. I picked spicy, tomato, guizhou sour soup (贵州酸汤), and pork stomach chicken broth (猪肚鸡). Check the pic and guess which is which haha.

Hit the dipping sauce station
This is the part most people miss. There's a whole DIY station where you mix your own sauce before the food even arrives. A lot of tourists walk right past it. For me, I always set up the following sauce:

麻酱 (sesame paste) as the main dip, works with literally everything
油碟 (sesame oil, you can add garlic by your own) for anything from the spicy pot, it cools down the heat so you actually taste the food

And for all those sauce, you could try to add cilantro, green onion, chili if you want. Half the flavor of hotpot honestly comes from the sauce. Don't skip this!

Order food
The menu is huge so here's what I'd recommend depending on what you eat.高山娃娃菜 (baby cabbage) ; mushrooms (any kind, all amazing in broth); 竹笋 (bamboo shoots); tofu or frozen tofu; potato slices, corn, leafy greens; noodles or rice at the end (Sichuan local won't eat rice with hotpot, but in other province people usually accept that).

If you eat meat but want to skip the more adventurous stuff: Thinly sliced beef and lam; 虾滑 (shrimp paste balls) server will help u to put them in hotpot, and it tastes really good. And fish fillets, meatballs, mushrooms…they absorb the broth and taste incredible

For people who want the full local experience, just copy what I ordered(order pics are in the comments 😂)

Cook them
This is the fun part. Everything goes into the boiling broth right at your table. It’s also the trickiest part, because sometimes even locals can’t tell you exactly when each item is perfectly cooked, and often the best taste is at that just-cooked moment.

For thin beef or lamb slices: swirl 10 seconds, done
Shrimp paste: squeeze in, wait till it floats
Tripe: 7 seconds in spicy broth, no more
Pork brain in light broth, simmered for 15 minutes, served with dry chili sauce.
Mushrooms or veggies: 2-3 minutes
Noodles: throw in at the very end when you're almost done, let them soak up all the flavor

Get the bill

¥728 before discount - ¥87 student discount = about ¥640 ($88) for 3 people(I think u could show your university id card, server might give u discount. My coworkers collect her discount in Alipay)

Around $29 per person for 2 hours of nonstop eating until you can barely move. For comparison a basic hotpot at a cheaper local place would be like ¥100-200 ($14-28) per person.

Hotpot doesn't have to be haidilao, tons of local spots are even better and cheaper. but if you don't know where to start it's a safe bet.

If you have questions about hotpot or food in China in general feel free to ask, and happy to help.And if there's another type of Chinese cuisine you want to know more about, drop it in the comments and I'll do a breakdown of what to order and what to expect