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Maybe not F's favorite food, but delicious all the same...

My Current Favorite Foodz

My current absolute favorite food is this spiced rabbit casserole from our Turkish cookbook by Ghillie Bhasan. Another discovery lately is bulghur wheat.



So combining the two most certainly makes me smile. I fried a carrot (cut julienne) for 10 minutes --- another thing that can make anyone smile. I think there should be a dessert just based on this --- it's delicious!

Anyway, we did not come up with it ourselves, it's actually based on a bulghur recipe by the Ghilster.



Yum-o.

Bored?

After two Saarland-posts, I am sure all of yous are more than ready for us to move to our next destination. But wait! We have just discovered this wonderful Délices de Tête at our French supermarket. It is just a calf's not a bull's head, but oh so delicious.

For those of you wondering about when we are leaving the Saarland and where we will go, we can tell you that we are wondering the same. Still no word from USCIS about our visa application, and negotiations about our lease of a 3000 sq ft house with Steinway grand piano are also still ongoing.

So who knows, maybe we'll get to enjoy the délices de tête for much longer than we think...

Better Late Than Never...

A's aunt and uncle were visiting a few weeks ago.

We showed them Saarland's beautiful cows.

Quintessential Saarland

Great for biking...

One More...

... before returning to our normal schedule. A always makes fun of my facial expressions when I "dance", but this video made me realize it is just because I grew up in the 80s.

Music Maestro!

All Too Familiar

Our last dinner we went to one of our favorite restaurants. Again, maybe not the best restaurant in Beijing, but very comforting dishes and flavors. The restaurant is appropriately named: it translates to something like "all too familiar".

We had Taiwanese Style Pork, Sichuan fish, Beijing duck, and other stuff that I did not take pictures of.



But I just had to take pictures of these delicious balls!

Happy Valley

We spent the day being amused in amusement park Happy Valley.

Scary kittens that we are, we did not take all the rides.

This one looked fine.



Being upside down for a whole ride took a little more balls.



Look at Amanda in happy anticipation of so much fun.

Just another day in China...

... with just a touch of culture shock on the side.

Welcome to Eat Zhajiangmian

On our last day in Beijing (for now), we had zhajiangmian for lunch (again).

Yum-o!

Musical Intermezzo

Update: bonus vid



You're welcome!

Great Beijing Food

Amanda then took us to her other new favorite restaurant: Meizhou Dongpo.



And, of course, this was an excellent choice.



The main attraction was the dongporou, pictured above: perfect texture, wonderful flavors, and as an added bonus, a little spiciness.



So good in fact, that it warrants two photos.

The other dishes (dongpo sausage, soup with a special vegetable, these vegetables with some tofu, and the tofu below) were excellent as well. But the dongporou was in a league of its own.



Here is were the magic happened:

For Old Times' Sake

Su Shi is not the best restaurant in Beijing. But we ate there the first night we arrived in Beijing, and many times after that. We cubed the cycle and had another duck.



Another favorite is this egg with veggies. They outdid themselves with both, and gave us even more happy memories!

Frog Hot Pot

Amanda took us to her new favorite restaurant, where we ate frog hot pot. Yum!

798!

We of course paid a visit to our favorite art district in Beijing: 798.

Korean Food

Another thing we were looking very much forward to in Beijing: our local Korean restaurant.



It did not disappoint at all!

These are just a few of the many, many, many dishes we had for lunch.

Golden Tripod Attic

Another favorite in Beijing: Golden Tripod Attic near the Olympic Village.



This restaurant has awesome dumplings.



Yum...



... o.



Also: some surprisingly good okra.



I forgot what these cakes where made of, but I remember enjoying them tremendously.



Interestingly enough, the sweeter dishes turned out to be harder to photograph.