Fish eyes, pig feet
(Silver fish soup: Zhouzhuang, China)
I’m safely installed back in Glasgow after an incredibly long day of travelling yesterday. Just as I lay down to sleep last night, Ying texted me to tell me goodnight as he was just up and having breakfast. Since I didn’t sleep during my journey (which began at 9am China time and ended at 10pm GMT, and therefore 21 hours), I had effectively done the equivalent of staying up all night and falling asleep the following morning. That explains why I feel quite tired today. As soon as this is published I am headed for what is a very cold bedroom in comparison to Suzhou. The change in temperature I experienced yesterday was a sultry 28 degrees in Shanghai to a nippy 1 degree in Glasgow.
I thought I’d give you another glimpse of my varied Chinese diet; Ying’s mum ordered this soup for us on our day trip to the canal town of Zhouzhuang. These fish are just known as ‘silver fish’ and as you can see, they have lost their scales in cooking and are eaten whole by the spoonful. They look like strange ghostly worms bathing in a soupy swamp. Apparently they are very good for you, though we coupled this dish with a cooked pig trotter that is, shall we say, not particularly good for you. Pig trotter is a delicacy in this region and we relished it, though ingesting some of the fat surrounding the succulent meat was unavoidable. Both dishes were delicious, though possibly not the fare for the slightly cautious diner or for the faint hearted.
