My Beijing itinerary had no mention of the Forbidden City or the Great Wall. All it read was:
“Shop. Shop. Shop. More shopping, if time permits.”
Due to time constraint, I had to decide between Yashow Market and Silk Market (Xiushui). In the end, I went to the latter merely cuz it’s famous and reportedly the city’s third main tourist attraction after the aforementioned attractions. It made me feel somewhat better to have visited at least one tourist attraction, you know? =)
This “shopping mall” is huge, with several levels of stalls selling a wide range of fashion accessories and apparels. Some of the sellers can be pretty aggressive but I don’t mind cuz I’m good at ignoring people. It’s a MUST to bargain if something catches your fancy since the people will mark up the price by about 500% or something like that. Really no joke. Anyway, I’m happy that I’ve got a few great buys! Turtleneck for $11, where to find in Singapore?! So you can imagine how much fun I had there, haha.
I did zilch research on food in Beijing so it was a day of eating whatever caught my fancy. There’s a franchise of Yogorino, an Italian ice cream company, near the main entrance so I had a nice cup of Greek-style frozen yogurt. Then, a stranger recommended the roasted chestnuts at one of the stalls in the basement. Me loving all things chestnut, I definitely had to get some! Fabulous to munch on fresh, hot chestnuts in winter~
I shopped till around 10pm when the Silk Market finally shut its door for the day. By then, I was so hungry! Opposite the market are some eateries that are still open so I picked one randomly while crossing my fingers that the food will be decent.
To me, the most “China-China” dish is 西红柿炒鸡蛋, a.k.a. stirred-fried tomato and eggs, cuz my grandma used to tell me that this dish is from China whenever she cooked it. This is my first time trying the real McCoy in China! Very hearty and so simple (just tomato, egg, garlic, salt and oil) that I think I can replicate this at home~
I think my years of reading Higher Chinese have gone down the drain. I didn’t realise that the ‘腊’ in 腊八豆粗粮包 refers to meat so I happily ordered that, thinking it’s vegetarian. It turned out to be minced meat with fermented soy beans, with the cutest buns surrounding it. Yup, that’s how I became an accidental meat eater that day, after years of not consuming meat. Hence, the title of this post. So much for adventurous eating! LOL.
My Food Sirens II 