Snackums

In lieu of Halloween candy updating... (will do that at some point):
Snacks from China, brought to me by my dad when he went to China in the summer. Consumed before Halloween so that I can make space for chocolate and such (actually, my room has a lot of space. Plenty of room to store food...and no mice [yet]).

Square cracker thingys: really spicy and tasted a bit like stale wasabi.
Green plastic packaging: delicious spicy tofu. Vacuum packed. It's like jerky...but it's tofu!!!
Yellow plastic packaging: more spicy tofu jerky in oil.
Bamboo shoots: pickled and spicy.
Mushrooms: pickled and spicy (and really oily)
Dried kiwi: did not taste like kiwi. Way too green to be naturally preserved kiwi...bland and not that delicious :( :( The seeds were real though.
Lotus seeds: Moist and nutty.

Ma Hua ("Sesame Flowers")

I really don't know what these are called in English, but the translation of 麻花 (ma2hua1) is "Sesame Flowers". I suppose "Braided Twists with Sesame Seeds" is a better description of the food product though. In the past, I've only eaten the mini version of these ma2hua1, since that was the only kind sold at Kamman, and I don't recall ever eating these in China/HK. I don't think it ever occurred to my mum to buy these for us, actually.

Thus, I feel quite indifferent to these crunchy, crispy, ultra unctuous (Don't ask me how, but oil was leaking out of the neatly-sealed plastic, into the tin, and even out of the tin) sweet fried pieces of dough studded with white sesame seeds.

They've a hint of ginger and are quite sweet, which is not what I'd expected from ma2hua1. The ones I've had in the past (and generally all fried crispy Chinese street food) is savoury, so this is a surprise.

This is another of those traditional Wuhan foods, but again, I'm not sure whether this huge sweet version is authentic. My mum told me about when she was younger, she used to buy ma2hua1, the size of her finger, for for a few cents at street stalls. That size seems more appropriate considering the ma2hua1 I've eaten in the past. Instead of having 2 x 6 strands of dough being twisted together, it was only two strands of dough (Well, technically one strand, since it would be folded in half, and the two ends would be looped around each other).

I think I prefer the finger-sized seaweed flavoured (or even just the original flavoured) ma2hua1 that I've had before. Just my preference.

Hot Dry Noodles (Wuhan Specialty)

In exchange for providing my cousin with ongoing hours of ACT and TOEFL prep, my uncle bought me food which my dad brought back food from his trip to China. There is nothing I'd rather have, especially as the food they got is just unobtainable here in the U.S., or it's really expensive, or the shipping fee costs more than the actual food product. Wuhan is a city in Hubei province, and my uncle and his family live there, as does a local culture of pretty delicious food. My mum always reminds me that Wuhan cuisine is quite spicy and numbing - 麻辣 (ma2 la4).

Today at lunch, my mum made some of the Hot Dry Noodles, 热干面 (re4 gan1 mian4 - it's literally called "Hot Dry Noodles" in Chinese), from a package of them that we got from my uncle. Of course, normal Hot Dry Noodles are eaten in dingy little restaurants or at street food stands in Wuhan. I remember this one time we went to my mum's friend's restaurant when I was really young, and the Hot Dry Noodles were too spicy for me, so I didn't really appreciate them.

Despite the fact that we didn't eat the straight-from-the-pot-in-a-cheap-Wuhan-eatery Hot Dry Noodles, the packaged version still reminded me of those sultry summers when I was in China, forced to eat Chinese food all the time, and being fussed over because we were "foreign". It's actually pretty funny because once, at one of those banquet dinners, my relatives ordered some fries for me and my brother because we refused to eat the Chinese dishes. The fries ended up being extremely spicy, due to the fact that the oil that the restaurant used was spicy. It's pretty funny, now that I think of it.

The Hot Dry Noodles came with packets of sauce that usually is homemade at those roadside eateries. One is a sort of chili oil with carrots and ginger, another is sesame sauce (sesame paste and sesame oil), and the other is soy sauce. The Hot Dry Noodles today were so spicy that I only used half the package of chili oil, and I had to eat a lot of bread on the side. They weren't as numbing as I remember them to be, which is a good thing. I don't really like the numbing sensation, even though it's always present in Ma Po DouFu - ma2 po2 dou4 fu3 (麻婆豆腐). I think that my brother was more zealous about these noodles than I was; he sighed that these reminded him of Wuhan. I don't feel too much nostalgia from eating these, which is a little bizarre. Even though it doesn't look sanitary (food inspections?! Psh, yeah right), if you ever go to Wuhan, you should try these! They're probably not going to be plated neatly, and the cook may tell you to hurry up and pay the few yuan already, but Hot Dry Noodles are one of the most famous dishes in Wuhan (this statement is backed up by my cousin's response to a TOEFL Speaking question).