A tale of three cities

Earlier this month I took a weeklong trip to China. I visited its three most prosperous cities: Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. The trip was eye-opening as both Beijing and Shanghai have changed immensely since I visited almost a decade ago. I could feel the booming Chinese economy while I was there.

Striking architecture: future CCTV Tower in Beijing, construction has resumed after a serious fire last year

In Beijing, huge plots of land downtown have been transformed into glistening shopping malls and office towers. I reckoned none of the buildings on the street where I stayed was more than ten years old. Keep in mind Beijing is an ancient city, then you recognize the scale of the changes. These can be good or bad, depending on your perspective. The question lingering in my mind: what sacrifices ordinary citizens had to make for them to happen?

Not interested in international brands that filled downtown to the brim, I ventured out to find remnants of old Beijing. My find? A century-old pastry shop dated back to the Qing Dynasty called Daoxiangcun (稻香村;  roughly translated into “Village of Fragrant Rice”). I liked it so much that I went there multiple times during my stay, and brought some of its products back to the US as gifts.

Daoxiangcun started as a single store but has now grown into hundreds of outlets across China. There are tens of outlets in Beijing alone. It sells all kinds of sweet and salty, probably bad-for-you snacks. Most of them are uniquely Chinese, but there are also many Western items. It allows you to buy only one piece of an item so I got to try MANY things.

Some sweets I tried: traditional pastries with fillings of adzuki bean paste, mung bean paste, red date paste, black sesame seed paste, osmanthus paste, pineapple paste; walnut and honey cakes; wafers with peanut paste; fried dough in twists (mahua). Savories: ready-t0-eat shredded tofu sheets, marinated tofu nuggets and mock meat.

Daoxiangcun treats VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Almost everything tasted great and was good value. I knew I wouldn’t go wrong as many locals buy Daoxiangcun products for themselves or as gifts. The cost of living in Beijing is surprisingly high (many categories are on par with Hong Kong), so Daoxiangcun is a relative bargain.

I spent two days in Shanghai with my parents. My dad was kind enough to suggest going to a vegetarian restaurant for dinner because both my mom and I are vegetarians. I found Jichancao (吉祥草; roughly translated into “Auspicious Grass”) on Dianping, China’s version of Yelp.

Jichancao’s storefront

Located in the leafy former French Concession, Jichancao has a modern, Zen-style décor with a small Buddhist bookstore appended to it. We ordered savory dishes (pumpkin stew, braised tofu, etc.), Northern dim-sums (steamed dumplings, Chinese flatbread/shaobing), noodles, and sweet rice dumplings to round out the meal. Overall the food was delicious in a Shanghainese way (greasy with a hint of sweetness). The meal was not expensive either given Shanghai’s living standards.

Braised tofu with tomatoes, mushrooms, napa cabbage, Chinese celery

(From left) Pumpkin stew, sweet rice dumplings, Chinese flatbread with diced dill fillings

The most elaborate meal I had during my trip was in Hong Kong. My mom managed to book a table at the talk-of-the-town Amy’s House (愛美素食坊), a vegetarian “private kitchen” in a residential building that serves only one table during each meal period. We had lunch there, and chef Amy presented eight courses typical of a Cantonese dinner banquet. Completely self-taught and now in her late 50s or even 60s, Amy created an innovative feast of different flavors and textures from appetizers to desserts.

The best course was the coral seaweed salad appetizer with shredded carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, and guavas. Then there were imitations of Cantonese classics such as pan-fried shark’s fin, steamed chicken, and braised pork belly. Amy gave each dish a poetic name and asked us to guess its ingredients before putting it onto the table. The entire experience was like a show.

Best in show: coral seaweed salad with wasabi soy sauce

More appetizers: spring rolls and fried Chinese squash

Pan-fried imitation shark’s fin topped with braised pumpkin and snow peas

Imitation steamed chicken (tofu sheets) topped with bok choy, minced ginger and spring onions

No doubt Amy is a masterful cook given the complexity of each dish, but the cooking sometimes masked the original flavors of the ingredients. I found the imitation braised beef taste too much like real beef too. Don’t get me wrong: the meal was wonderful, and I appreciated that my mom arranged it for me.

Back in the US, I felt even more grateful to be living in the Bay Area. Although Amy bought her ingredients fresh from the market daily, the quality of the produce here seems better.

Like the last time I was in Hong Kong, I enjoyed eating at home with my family the most though. Too bad I only had time to do this once on the trip.

To my family and friends, happy 2011 wherever you are!

Sweets in Portland

Yummy fresh mint flake and banana cream pie ice cream from Ruby Jewel

You don’t think I would miss out on sweets during my trip to Portland, OR, do you? I need a separate post on all the ones I tried.

As a foodie city, Portland has great dessert options, especially on the vegan front. Like savories, some of the most interesting sweets are from food carts.

Along Mississippi Avenue I found Flavorspot, a long-standing waffle sandwich cart. I ordered a sweet cream and jam waffle. Because the waffle was made on the spot, it was warm and crisp. The fillings were not cloyingly sweet. It was a simple yet satisfying sandwich.

Flavorspot “food cart,” though it’s really a stand

Freshly made sweet cream and jam waffle

In the Hawthorne cart pod, Perierra Crêperie offers a wide variety of savory and sweet crêpes. I got something simple here too: a lemon and sugar crêpe. The girl who took my order zested the lemons, poured the batter onto the crêpe pan, then finished the crêpe in a couple of minutes.

A taste of France: Perierra Crêperie

My lemon and sugar crêpe

The crêpe was fresh (half of what makes a good crêpe) but bland-tasting. Luckily, the vibe of the cart made up for it. The two girls running the cart wore retro-style aprons and played French-sounding songs in the background. They were cheerful, full of energy, and having fun. It’d be a stretch to say I felt I were in Paris, but they put me in a groovy mood.

Portland was hot when I was there, so ice cream immediately came to mind. I read a Portland Monthly Magazine article on the best ice cream in Portland, and managed to try one of the places featured. Lovely’s Fifty-Fifty on Mississippi Avenue (yes, this street has a lot of great food) is a pizzeria that also sells house-made ice cream. I tried the cherry and salted caramel flavors. Both were rich and intense and I even bit into chunks of cherries. It certainly didn’t skimp on ingredients.

Excellent cherry and salted caramel ice cream from Lovely’s Fifty-Fifty

Just a couple blocks down from Lovely’s Fifty-Fifty is Ruby Jewel, a local ice cream producer known for its ice cream sandwiches. The store is a cavernous space with a nostalgic, diner-style décor meant for people to linger. It has a larger menu than Lovely’s Fifty-Fifty, and even several vegan flavors. However, the vegan blueberry lavender flavor I tasted didn’t impress me, so I went with fresh mint flake and banana cream pie.

Welcoming Ruby Jewel ice cream store

The ice cream was excellent. As American-style ice cream, it was almost as good as San Francisco’s favorite Bi-Rite Creamery. But I liked the lighter, gelato-like variant at Lovely’s Fifty-Fifty better.

Well, I had dessert for breakfast too. The vegan Black Sheep Bakery has a stand in the mainstream PSU Farmers' Market – another proof that Portland is vegan haven. My huge apple-spice crumb cake was wonderfully moist, and didn’t have the off-taste often found in vegan cakes that contain no eggs.

Black Sheep Bakery’s apple-spice crumb cake

The best dessert that I had? A slice of vegan hazelnut cake with strawberry frosting from the vegan Back to Eden Bakery in the Alberta Arts District.  My cake was perfect, especially its slightly coarse texture due to the ground hazelnuts in the batter. The frosting was at just the right level of sweetness.

Perfect vegan hazelnut cake with strawberry frosting

All-vegan Back to Eden Bakery

I also spoke to the two owners of the bakery. They were young, charming, or even innocent-looking. The bakery’s website says it is committed to “a love for the animals, and a love for this planet,” and this is evident from the artwork lining the walls and the carefully picked green merchandise. They really put their heart into the store.

Perhaps this is the best part of Portland: young people following their ideals and trying out ideas, be they a food cart or vegan bakery, which might otherwise be impossible in more expensive cities such as New York and San Francisco.

Sweetpea Baking Company in Portland’s “vegan mall” complex

I was disappointed with Sweetpea Baking Company though - the vegan bakery supposed to represent Portland’s vegan scene. I might have gone there too late in the afternoon; there wasn’t much to buy. Maybe the staff were being laid-back, but they seemed too hip or busy with whatever they were doing to talk to me.

Redwoods in Portland’s beautiful Hoyt Arboretum

Portland’s International Rose Test Garden in full bloom

With its beautiful outdoors, youthful spirit, offbeat yet authentic character, Portland is a great place to visit, whether you’re vegan or not. I left Portland with a full stomach and hoped I would soon return.

Veg and hip: not SF

Yes, you read right.

Portland, Oregon consistently ranks as one of the most vegetarian-friendly cities in the U.S, even ahead of San Francisco. It’s also known for being hip and progressive. During my stay there over Labor Day weekend, I experienced all these and more.

Bustling Portland Saturday Farmers’ Market

Nowhere I’ve been takes vegetarians and vegans more seriously than Portland. I rarely have problems finding things to eat at restaurants in the U.S., but in many cases I need to ask whether a dish contains meat. In Portland, restaurants indicate vegetarian and vegan options clearly, not to mention the large number of vegetarian spots, given Portland’s small size. You won’t draw a blank look if you tell people you’re a vegan.

Vegetarian food in Portland is not only abundant, but also creative and affordable. This is most evident from its 500+ food cart scene. While some carts serve regular fast food, many pride themselves on artisan/gourmet/one-of-a-kind offerings normally found (or not found) in restaurants. My most interesting meals in Portland were all from the carts.

The carts are clustered in “pods” scattered across the city. There is usually a communal dining area with picnic tables in each pod. I checked out various pods, and liked the two in the residential area where I stayed in northeastern Portland the most.

In the Mississippi Marketplace pod, I tried the chickpea sandwich ($6.5) from the Garden State cart. The made-t0-order sandwich consisted of a fried chickpea patty, shredded carrots, radishes, lettuces, and lemon aioli layered between ciabatta bread. The sandwich had a great bite, the fillings were warm and crunchy, and the crispy bread soaked up the creamy aioli sauce. It was the first thing I ate in Portland and I was blown away.

Garden State food cart

Warm, made-to-order chickpea sandwich

Then I had the quinoa pancake ($4.5) from the organic, all-vegan Ruby Dragon cart. The cart owner wore a thick beard and dreadlocks – probably what a visitor expects Portland’s hippies to look like. But Ruby Dragon puts out seriously good food. The “Tiger’s Paw” pancake is made from fresh ground quinoa flour and hempseeds, with blueberries and walnuts mixed into the batter.  Also made-to-order then topped with maple syrup, it had a fragrant, nutty flavor and complex texture. One of the best pancakes I’ve ever had.

Ruby Dragon food cart

One of the best I’ve ever had: quinoa and hempseed pancake

For dinner, how about a Venezuelan platter from the Fuego de Lotus (literally fire of lotus) food cart in the Alberta Arts District? This was the first time I had Venezuelan food and I loved it. The “Revolutionaries Plate” ($7) included arepas (masa cakes), cilantro rice, black beans topped with cotija (a sharp, white cheese of Mexican origin), and cabbage salad. The warm, homey food was the perfect antidote to a breezy night.

Venezuelan “Revolutionaries Plate”

Another upside of this pod: diners eat under a cabana-like structure with decorative light strings dangling over the beams. It felt DIY yet elegant. I could see the sky and a few lonesome stars when I ate. With music blaring in the background, this would be a wonderful date spot.

Fuego de Lotus food cart

The other night I got a slice of vegan pizza ($3.5) at Bella Faccia Pizzeria on Alberta Street. The pizza was decent: tempeh crumbles, onions, bell peppers, tomatoes on top of a “cashew/roasted pepper/tomato base” and thin crust. A very small but growing number of pizzerias now offer vegan pizzas, but you usually have to order an entire pie. I was impressed that Bella Faccia had vegan slices readily available.

Vegan pizza slice from Bella Faccia Pizzeria

But there were misses too. One was the vegan poutine ($4.5) from the popular Potato Champion cart in the offbeat Hawthorne District. Poutine is a classic Quebec dish of Belgian frites and cheese curds doused in gravy. Maybe I should have tried the regular version, but the gravy smothering the frites and tofu (instead of cheese) in my vegan version was too thick. I could almost taste the cornstarch in it.

Potato Champion food cart specializing in fried potato

Vegan poutine from Potato Champion

Most food carts in Portland are run by young people about my age. I wondered whether they did this as a career, or a stepping stone to something else, like becoming a chef at a restaurant. I felt it’s the former.

Running a food cart is tough – almost like running an outdoor restaurant – but the cart owners seemed content with it. They chatted with one another in the pod over cigarettes and beer during downtime. Their life looked carefree to an outsider. Is this what being a hippie in Portland means?

My best food experience in Portland, however, didn’t require psychoanalysis and was strikingly simple. I came across Freddy Guys Hazelnuts at the Portland State University Saturday Market, the city’s flagship farmers’ market. The dry roasted hazelnuts ($5) I bought there were heaven.

Best of Portland: farm-fresh dry roasted hazelnuts

The hazelnuts had a fresh, intense, slightly sweet flavor, and were super-crunchy after they were roasted. Salt was unnecessary. After I opened the package, I couldn’t stop eating. (Well, this happens whenever I eat nuts.) California produces top-quality almonds and walnuts – but no hazelnuts. I will probably order from Freddy Guys in the future.

Stay tuned for my second post on my trip to Portland. You might have noticed that a whole category of food is conspicuously missing from this post…

Another dreamy farm tour

I love the country, but because I don’t have a car, I jump on any chance to get out there through other means. I had a wonderful time on the Pacific Coast Farmers’ Market Association farm tour along the San Mateo Coast last year, so I signed up for this year’s tour to Watsonville as soon as I learned about it.

Watsonville is close to Santa Cruz and known for its agricultural produce. We visited three farms on this trip: Phil Foster Ranches, Far West Fungi, and Hillview Farm. Like last year, we enjoyed an outdoor farm-to-table lunch prepared on the spot in the middle of the trip.

Each farm operates very differently from one another. Phil Foster Ranches is a large, commercial, all-organic farm that hires tens of workers and uses machinery extensively. It grows a wide range of crops. During our trip in late August, we saw leeks, lettuces, chards, summer squash, strawberries, and the early crop of apples.

So liberating to be on a farm like this

Rows of chards

These are summer squash actually

When Phil encouraged us to go into the fields to taste the strawberries and apples, we were like kids unleashed and scouted for the plumpest fruits. Nothing beats the taste of freshly picked fruits; the strawberries were amazing.

Strawberries still on the plant

The scenery was also picture-perfect. Imagine a boundless clear sky under which long, parallel rows of crops gradually converge into a backdrop of gently sloping mountains. Phil was proud of his farm; even his dog was having fun when showing us around. Obviously it was an idealized picture, but I wondered what it’d be like to live and work on a farm like this.

Apple trees

Phil’s dog taking a break

We then moved on to Far West Fungi. Before we toured the farm, we sat down to have lunch made using produce from Phil Foster Ranches and mushrooms from Far West Fungi. The vegetarian menu included crostini topped with pureed broccoli and grilled mushrooms, cauliflower soup, and a salad of tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions, and feta.

Farm-to-table alfresco lunch

The most delicious items were those that brought out the freshness of the ingredients, such as the mushrooms and salad. It was a hot day, so the aqua fresca the chefs made from several types of melons served as a great thirst quencher.

Far West Fungi is a small, multi-generation family business. It sells both edible and medicinal mushrooms, and has a store in the San Francisco Ferry Building. The farm has great views of the Pacific Ocean, but it’s far from quaint. This was my first time seeing mushrooms grown on a commercial scale, and I quickly realized that they don’t come from enchanted forests we read about in fairy tales.

Different kinds of mushrooms grown at Far West Fungi

Instead, the mushrooms sprouted from “blocks” of organic matter housed in dark, damp container-like structures. I can’t remember exactly, but the organic matter was something like compost or dead wood. It takes months for the mushrooms to break down the organic matter and grow big enough for human consumption. The blocks were placed on rows of shelves, and it’s a bit eerie walking past blocks of protruding mushrooms in various shapes.

John, the owner, holding one of the “blocks” and explaining how to grow mushrooms

Yellow-headed mushrooms, but I couldn’t remember the name

Intimidating-looking matsutake mushrooms

Before we left the containers, the owner offered some maitake mushrooms for us to taste raw. But the smell of decay inside the containers put me off and I didn’t taste any.

Our final stop of the tour was Hillview Farm, another family-run business that grows 100+ varieties of apples and other fruits. Walking among the apple trees under the sun is like experiencing California in the movies, and I couldn’t help marveling the bounty.

Apples for tasting before the tour at Hillview Farm

California’s bounty – apples everywhere

Since everything seemed so perfect, it was a letdown when the owner told us he sprayed the apples and couldn’t afford to go organic. I understand organic farming is expensive, but as a consumer, I was reluctant to taste any more apples on the farm after the revelation. Perhaps there’s a better way for the owner to convey that piece of information?

As we were heading back to San Jose at the end of the tour, I felt thankful that I could join a tour like this again. Call it a marketing ploy on the part of the farmers if you want, but it makes a huge difference for me to know the person who grows my food, given the problems of our faceless, industrial food system. I’m now more determined to buy from farmers’ markets whenever possible.

The state of vegetarian food in Hong Kong

Forgive me. I know I went to Asia in July and it’s the end of August. But I must share my thoughts on my hometown’s vegetarian food. This will be the last post on my Asia trip, I promise!

As I mentioned in a previous post, I returned to Asia as a vegetarian for the first time on this trip. I felt that Hong Kong’s Chinese vegetarian food continues to be superior, but options are lacking in other cuisines.

When people think of Hong Kong’s vegetarian food, they most likely have mom-and-pop Chinese vegetarian restaurants in mind. Scattered across the city, these restaurants are low-to-mid market, often have a Buddhist bent, and the average customer is middle-aged or above. Their menu consists of a predictable range of Cantonese dim-sums and dishes.

So it was refreshing when my parents brought me to Gaia Veggie Shop, a modern vegetarian restaurant in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong’s busiest shopping district. Unlike the traditional vegetarian restaurants we went frequently when I lived in Hong Kong, Gaia has many interesting items such as sushi on its pan-Asian menu. The restaurant was completely full with eaters of all ages when we went on a Sunday night. A promising sign on what’s to come.

We ordered a couple of Chinese dishes as well as Japanese sushi hand rolls. The cone-shaped hand rolls filled with tempura, julienned bell peppers and daikons were outstanding. The Chinese dishes were decent though a bit too heavily seasoned. I liked the Shanghainese veggie dumplings in a clear broth the most.

Japanese sushi hand roll at Gaia

Excellent Shanghainese veggie dumplings in soup

Classic Cantonese dish: braised bitter melon with mock meat

Dad and I also went to one of the old-school Chinese vegetarian restaurants for lunch. Tong Fong Siu Kee Yuen (roughly translated as The East’s Little Garden of Respect) has been around for decades but little has changed since I left Hong Kong.

We ordered a fried tofu skin appetizer, vegetable curry clay pot, and noodles topped with a vegetable medley. Many office workers were there for a quick lunch so all dishes came under 10 minutes (talk about Hong Kong-style efficiency!). The food was good and affordable. Few restaurants in the U.S. could deliver better value than this.

Crispy fried tofu skin appetizer served with Chinese vinegar

Generous portion of noodles topped with vegetable medley

Steaming hot but non-spicy vegetable curry in a clay pot

But Hong Kong probably falls short in Western and other ethnic vegetarian food. I didn’t have enough time to explore, but I had not come across a single non-Chinese vegetarian eatery in Hong Kong. I only ate at one fine dining restaurant during my stay in Hong Kong, but I think it’s fair to say that chefs are not yet used to accommodating vegetarians.

Remember my family celebrated Dad’s birthday at a fancy restaurant? It’s a high-end restaurant in a private club with white tablecloths and formal service. Unfortunately there’s no vegetarian entree on the menu, and the chef was unwilling to make special arrangements, even though we had called in advance.

In the end I got two vegetarian appetizers, creamed asparagus soup and artichoke tempura, the latter of which became my entree. While the dishes had great presentations and I don’t want to sound snobbish, the food I had at restaurants of similar caliber in San Francisco was better. I wondered if it’s the cooking or quality of ingredients that was to blame.

Elegantly presented creamed asparagus soup

My entree: artichoke tempura, with a side of truffled mashed potatoes

Another observation I had was there’s NO vegetarian option for lunch or dinner at local fast-food chains. I certainly didn’t expect McDonald’s or KFC to have vegetarian dishes, but given that these Hong Kong-style fast food places serve mostly Chinese food, it’s surprising that they don’t offer anything vegetarian.

I later perused Openrice, Hong Kong’s equivalent to Yelp, and found many innovative vegetarian restaurants I didn’t get to try. As vegetarianism becomes more mainstream, I hope to see more diversity in vegetarian options the next time I visit Hong Kong. Just look at Taiwan and Singapore, which do a much better job.