"I don't feel like baozi."
Ever since my last upset stomach which was immediately after eating the Wuxi specialty dumplings - xiao long bao - with their lovely sweet juicy meat, same as in the rou bao (meat filled steamed bread-rolls) that Peter is so fond of. I don't know if the dumplings caused the upset, its just that anything that has been tasted coming and going no longer has any appeal ...
"What do you want?"
"I want fish and chips. You know, a piece of battered fish, and you break it open and there's all that succulent white fish inside ... "
Not fish that is in the middle of a lazy-susan and you reach out with your trembling chopsticks to grab a piece and lift it carefully across to your tiny bowl without losing too much on the way ... only to find that you've picked a piece that consists almost entirely of bones.
Off Peter went, and I rummaged around in the cupboard and found a tin of tuna, and made myself some fresh salad with lettuce and tomato and cucumber. He hadn't returned, so I got on with my lunch, and cleaned up the kitchen a bit - still no Peter. I was beginning to wonder if something could have actually happened to him.
Finally he came home and proudly handed me a red plastic bag. "Very fresh!" he commented as I put the bag on the kitchen counter and watched it proceed to jump around - not quite the fish and chips I'd had in mind!
"Its okay, the guy scaled it and removed the stomach." Obviously the fish wasn't too pleased about that! "I'll fillet it for you, and you can have some lovely fish just like back home."
He took it out of the bag, and it must have caught sight of the knife. It leapt around and splattered blood all over the place - it would have gone out the window and landed four floors down if we hadn't quickly closed the window.
Well, yeah, he filleted it, and I fried it - but the bones seemed to still be an inherent part of the flesh. It was very tasty, but hard work to eat. The second fish I decided to steam whole, and it tasted good too. I don't think I've ever had a bonier fish, though.
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