I like spicy food. In fact, sometimes if soups or other asian foods are not spicy enough, I order “fresh chopped chili”. My friend Anoop introduced me to chopped chili and a little soy sauce years ago, and I’ve never looked back.
In Beijing, restaurant staff I came across often couldn’t believe that I was ordering làjiāo. In fact, despite practicing my pronunciation, showing a hand-drawn picture of a chili and even pointing to the word in my dictionary, I was generally met with looks of confusion.
In one restaurant we went to, the chaos my chili-wanting created involved 4 or 5 staff questioning me (and each other) for several minutes, confident that what I said I wanted must have been wrong. As you’ll see below, even when the chili came, it was almost whisked away, so sure were staff that there was no way I was actually going to eat it.
I did put the chili in this video in my food, and it was very good.
Loved the stories from China….went there and travelled alone into the “outback” where I never saw another Westerner in 3 weeks. It was the most amazing experience and insight into what a life people who cannot read or write must experience. Very sobering. I loved my cellphone to death…140 characters of SMS (before Twitter era) was my only connection back to my planet!
Got to love food stories. So much of our “understanding” of other cultures comes to us by food … it is fascinating to think through the stories behind our favourite “foreign” dishes.