food. Delicious #11 : Xiamen's delicate take out to the rescue!
Dear Steemit friends:
I don't know whether everyone's had this experience before, but let me describe it.. You're on vacation and at the end of a long day, you've come back to your hotel and it's already midnight. The only problem is, for some reason you're very hungry and crave some food but the restaurant in the hotel has long closed, and so has all the restaurants around the hotel. At that point in time, a take out can come save the day, just like charcoal in a snow storm!
In recent years, we really have to appreciate the internet, not just for the dissemination of memes about cats and platforms like Steemit, but also for the unwavering amount of technical innovation that has led to greater connectivity and the streamlining of businesses from being primarily offline to now offering goods and services online. In 2017 the take out business has been estimated to be worth around 11 Trillion dollars globally. Even companies like Uber have entered the takeout business. Surely the internet and these services have changed paradigm for how people spend their money on food.
The emergence of internet directory services for food take outs has changed the way people live their lives, especially at times like midnight. It would seem as though takeouts have really saved the world! Haha, just joking.. So, lets take a look at my experience with a takeout services whilst on holiday in Xiamen. I think it's a great opportunity to understand the local food a little better as well an opportunity to understand the culture of the local takeout services.
Believe it or not, it's sometimes a worry for people staying at Hotels to order takeouts. I remember once in Hainan, some guests brought takeout to the hotel and were asked to pay double the fee for their rooms. Here in Xiamen, they were welcoming of takeouts so it's not a big issue here it seems.
This takeout restaurant has quite a special name, it's literally called "A restaurant opened by a crappy person". I laughed out loud when I saw it but I must say, with such a name, it's hard to forget it! Lets find out what goodies they have in-store! I was impressed that they provided a table cloth as well - very thoughtful!
A ladle.. We didn't even order and soup dishes!
These are all the dishes we ordered, let me introduce what each of them are. In a previous Miss. Delicious post, I mentioned that Chinese people love to eat Hot and Numbing spicy dishes for midnight snacks. This takeout is no different and proves that theory yet again. I'm usually not as fond of Spicy food but my two friends love spicy food and insisted. We looked up the takeout directory on our takeout app, and found that 9 out of the 10 takeout restaurants were only serving spicy food. I guess I didn't really have a choice after all!
Rod Chilli Beef Strips - They've also added water bamboos into this dish, not only does it improve the taste, it also decorates the dish with another colour (aesthetics are important too!). After tasting it, I realised it wasn't actually very spicy at all, as long as you don't eat the chilli's it's actually very tasty.
When facing spicy dishes, steamed rice is always a necessity. Here the rice is mixed with a sauce made from the pork fats and is frequently eaten in the south of China as their main dish. Xiamen and even Taiwan frequently eat this rice. As a person that usually eats plain steamed white rice, I can definitely taste the extra flavour this Pork Sauce rice has.
As a city by the sea, Xiamen has some of the best fresh seafood. This is a a stir fry of squid. Usually the squid meat is quite tough, but here it has a softer complexion and retains much of the taste of the sea.
These are Fragrant Spicy Prawns. The smell alone is enough to make my mouth water. During the day, people in Xiamen like to eat non-spicy seafood, but come night time, all the seafood is peppered with literally chilli peppers and other spices. I guess you could say, no spice, no dice?!
Even these potato strips have Chilli Peppers. I must say though, that this dish goes really nicely with the Pork Rice.
As I was eating, I realised this takeout restaurant is really attentive to details. The chopsticks they provided have a really nice white and porcelain design on them. A little but nice touch!
Crispy-Fried Cayenne Peppered Chicken. Again, we're never far away from Chilli Peppers in any of the dishes.
These are handmade deep sea fish cakes. After this midnight feast, me and my friends were anything but sleepy.
The next day, we felt guilty eating such a big feast a night that we went for a belly dancing class haha!
Hope you enjoyed my report on the local Xiamen take out food! Sometimes the best food is eaten at the least expected times and from the most unexpected places. Stay tuned for more exciting food posts to come..!
If you are interested in my other blogs related to Food please check out these other blogs below ^^
