Life
Food critic: Enjoying fish as time goes by
By B.W. Liou (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-26 08:02
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With handheld video players, iPhones or a fistful of lamb skewers, hungry diners prepared for the long wait at Wushan Roast Fish on a recent Wednesday evening. Two shelves of comic books provided further welcome distraction, as did the walls of prickly Astroturf.
Having time to kill is also necessary at Secret Ingredient Fish Restaurant, where the instructions on the menu advise patrons to wait and sip the lao yin cha from Sichuan province, a reddish, soothing, medicinal, tea that helps to cleanse the palate. Good advice as on any given day, a 40-minute wait after ordering is not uncommon here.
Both restaurants keep their recipes a closely guarded secret but time may well be one of the key ingredients. After all, the only entree at either restaurant is barbecued fish, a dish imported from Chongqing province, and barbecued fish are definitely not to be rushed. So, the time spent in trivial pursuits is actually time well spent. At Wushan Roast Fish some even had time to write notes on one of the walls. One star-shaped paper read: "We're having a baby."
Taking time is also important when eating the fish. Eating in a hurry is a major drawback to enjoying a fish barbecue. Pecking is the point and there is a certain procedure to be followed when eating fish barbecue. Push aside the selected vegetables or roots, whether bok choy stems, oyster mushrooms, wood ear fungus or Devil's Tongue to reveal the charred skin. Eat that first, and then proceed to the meat.
At Wushan Roast Fish in Chaoyangmen, the butter fried grass carp finally arrived, glowing red with lantern chilies in a stew of chili oil and fish broth. The briny, tart broth of the sun you cay, or sour fish, filled with preserved mustard green, green chilies, cured tofu skin and mushrooms. Kept hot on a bowl of coals, the soup and the firm, white meat of the carp takes on a growing richness of chilies and vegetables as time goes by. The longer patrons take to eat, the redder their cheeks. By the end of a meal, napkins and beer bottles are usually scattered everywhere.
The xiang la kao yu, or fragrant grilled fish, was nearly too spicy to eat. Rice is essential to calm the smoky fire of this dish, which uses roasted red chilies in addition to the lantern chilies. However, the vegetables could have been cut into larger pieces, since most melted in 20 minutes. The two fish weighed 6.5 grams and cost 38 yuan per gram.
Secret Ingredient Fish Restaurant may serve a lighter-flavored fish but it is equally powerful in heat. Mushrooms, the red balloons of chilies, dried tofu plumped for the occasion, peanuts, ginger, garlic chunks, stalks of lemongrass sit in the reddish, muddy broth. The
Skin was much more crispy and blackened, a joy for those who love eating the fatty layer, as it melted after the crunch. The meat was plump and stayed perfectly medium-rare throughout the fish.
Located among the high-rises of Wang Jing this simple corner restaurant, established in 2005, prices its dishes at 35 yuan per gram.
After dining at both of the restaurants a friend joked wo yan da, duzi xiao (my eye is big, but the stomach small). Fish barbecue does that to you.
At both places, the fish is wonderful and simple. But rushing to eat, however, will cost you.
