A Fork in Asia's Road. Adventures of an Occidental Glutton

For those who don’t drive out into Beijing’s boondocks to find their dream pancake house, the top in-town alternative, favored by knowing locals and Japanese businessmen alike, is Tuanjiehu Roast Duck Restauran

Among the organic vegetables he utilizes, Arima grows his own kichi hikari breed of rice, a version he found through research to be “better than Italian.” After rape blossoms on a spoon of cold tomato aspic to wet the palate, he serves up a spring medley risotto, chock-full of broad beans and a bit of asparagus, plus a slow-boiled golden egg yolk and hint of bean paste, topped with paper-thin slices of lard — which, along with breads and sausages, the chef makes himself.

So the tourism institute’s executive chefs have been trying to mint new dishes to straddle categories, like a rendition of Portuguese rice with duck that substitutes Chinese sausage, and a shark’s fin soup that uses shredded bacalhau (salted cod) instead.

what “every Macanese boy got to taste after coming home from school.”
The dishes simmering in the pot could include diabo (from “devil”), a spicy red stew, and tacho, another earthy marvel made from pork knuckles, Portuguese chorizo sausage and various other leftover innards. One of the lost local delicacies, Zeca recalls, was crab cooked with shrimp paste and papaya flowers. The non-fruit-bearing trees that once sprouted these flowers have vanished from Macau, replaced by construction sites. So has much of the pleasure-centered way of life of its most easygoing people

Even restaurants that bill themselves as “Portuguese” usually have Chinese chefs and Macanese flavor. “Our ‘Portuguese chicken’ would never be found in Portugal,” admits Jose Ferreira, manager of the popular Pinocchio restaurant. “It’s baked in coconut milk and spiced with turmeric.” And the restaurant’s main draw is a specially invented curried crab smothered in Malay spices that would be a mystery to anyone in Lisbon.

But coming to terms with what is or isn’t Macanese cooking is no easy task. Many wrongly assume that it’s little more than a forced marriage between Portuguese techniques and Chinese ingredients. The best Macanese dishes are actually an amalgam of influences from the entire Portuguese empire. For example, balichao shrimp paste, a common ingredient, was brought by the Malay wives of the Portuguese from Malacca; curries came from Portugal’s former foothold in India, Goa; tamarind and coconut milk arrived from other Oriental ports.