This itinerary covers a diverse range of regional cuisines in China, from the hearty flavors of Northern cuisine to the fiery spice of SiChuan, the delicate dishes of JiangSu, and the fresh seafood of Cantonese cuisine.
Week 1: Beijing and Northern Cuisine
Sample Beijing's famous Peking Duck at renowned restaurants such as Quanjude or Da Dong.
Explore the bustling Wangfujing Snack Street and try local street food delicacies like jianbing (savory Chinese crepes) and lamb skewers.
Indulge in traditional Beijing snacks like zhajiangmian (noodles with soybean paste), douzhi (fermented mung bean soup), and tanghulu (candied fruit skewers).
Week 2: Sichuan Province and Spicy Cuisine
Experience the bold and spicy flavors of Sichuan cuisine with dishes like mapo tofu, kung pao chicken, and hot pot.
Visit Chengdu's famous food streets, such as Jinli Ancient Street and Kuanzhai Alley, to sample a variety of Sichuan snacks and street foods.
Explore local markets like Jinli and Wuhou, where you can taste authentic Sichuan specialties and shop for spices and ingredients.
Week 3: Shanghai and Jiangsu Cuisine
Enjoy Shanghai's vibrant food scene with a mix of classic dishes like xiaolongbao (soup dumplings), shengjianbao (pan-fried pork buns), and hairy crab.
Explore traditional Shanghainese restaurants and local eateries in areas like Yuyuan Garden, Xintiandi, and Tianzifang.
Sample Jiangsu cuisine specialties like braised pork belly, sweet and sour spare ribs, and freshwater delicacies from the nearby Yangtze River.
Week 4: Guangdong Province and Cantonese Cuisine
Discover the diverse flavors of Cantonese cuisine in Guangzhou, known for its fresh seafood, roasted meats, and dim sum.
Explore local markets like Shangxiajiu Pedestrian Street and Guangzhou's Wholesale Food Market to taste a wide range of Cantonese dishes and snacks.
Indulge in iconic Cantonese dishes such as roast duck, steamed fish, BBQ pork, and shrimp dumplings.
10 word summary : eat real (natural / unprocessed) food; be active; relax; be kind / appreciate.
The 'low fat (low saturated fat) diet' has led to increased disease and early mortality.
Real food - including, eggs, meat and dairy was replaced by highly processed toxic foods such as margarine, 'vegetable' oils, and refined grains. A recipe for disaster.
Over the last 100 years, cancer went from rare to common; same with heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, poor eyesight and degenerative brain disorders (these are all symptoms, not really diseases). Especially from the 1950s / 60s. So why ?
In short, increasing amounts of processed foods; though pollution, tobacco and alcohol also played a part. In particular, the cause of the increased incidence of disease was the adoption of the 'low fat diet' dogma, that allowed cheap, but nasty, 'food' to be made from 'vegetable' oils, plus sugar and refined carbohydrates (and a large variety of additives, such as artificial sweeteners and preservatives).
The big two culprits are :
*** 1) 'vegetable' (seed and bean) oils - sunflower, canola / rapeseed, corn, etc. These oils are highly processed, very unstable (easily oxidise and degrade) and are pro-inflammatory (omega-6).
Note that extra virgin olive oil is not a vegetable oil, and is un-processed. Saturated fats are not a problem. Neither is cholesterol - so essential to life that every cell can make it; and if they didn't, we'd die. It is needed by the brain, for making vitamin D and other hormones, and much, much more.
The problem isn't too much fat; the problem is eating the wrong fats. Don't think 'low fat', think 'good fat'.
Good fats include fish oil / cod liver oil (choose a good one), EVOO, butter / ghee, coconut oil.
*** 2) sugar and refined carb.s - bread, cakes, biscuits, pastries, colas, fruit juices, etc. These easily overload metabolism leading to fatty liver, weight gain and many other disturbances. Even whole-grains are not a good source of nutrition and have anti-nutrients (vegetables are where to get fiber, not grains).
Sugar and refined carb.s are addictive - the more you eat, the more you want.
Real food is the answer.
Rather than managing symptoms, we need to fix the root problem.
Avoid processed foods, also known as fake 'foods'.
Real foods include non-starchy vegetables (arugula, broccoli sprouts, garlic, tomato, onion, ...), meat (not the preserved type) and wild fish, some whole fruit (berries, avocados), nuts, eggs, cream, kefir; sauerkraut; kimchi. Small amounts of rice and pasta and potato may be okay for some people. High potassium 'lo salt'. Herbs and spices. Tea and coffee (unsweetened). The more variety, the better.
The microbiome in the gut is a key to health, and it needs real food. Start the regeneration.
The liver, in particular, but all the digestive system, and ultimately every part of the body, hates highly processed foods. End the poison. Kefir and sauerkraut can help.
Carnivore ? Vegan ?
The important thing is to avoid processed 'food', especially sugar, refined carb.s and 'vegetable' oils. Yet going to either extreme is far from ideal. Healthy keto would be a good choice, and maybe semi-keto for some. Variety. Quality (grass-fed, organic, etc.).
Animal foods for high quality protein and good fats; vegetables for fiber and their many phytonutrients (and feeding the gut microbiome).
Vegetarian ? Don't rely on fake 'meats' and include eggs, butter and cheese; plus fermented veggies. If include high quality eggs daily, a vegetarian diet can work.
Time restricted eating (and no snacks or 'grazing') and fasting.
Intermittent fasting (time-restricted eating) gives your body a chance to repair, heal and clean house.
Breakfast is the easiest meal to skip. Also, try not to eat for a few hours before sleep.
At root, the point is to balance energy storage and building the body, with using that stored energy and repairing the body.
1) Try to have a minimum of twelve hours a day not eating (the longer the better); 2) eat real food, not processed food.
This is important for everyone, but especially for diabetes / pre-diabetes (and that's almost the majority now).
Vitamins and supplements ?
It depends on one's circumstances and the quality of one's food. Because of soil depletion, intensive farming and breeding, food can be lacking in nutrients these days. While food is the go to, one might consider fish oil if do not eat fatty fish, vitamin D in the winter, + vitamin K2, CoQ10, magnesium, NAC (N-Acetyl Cysteine), nutritional yeast (or at least a B-complex or B1), and if not eating these : green tea extract and garlic extract.
Dr.s and professors who make sense include :
Mark Hyman, Jason Fung, Sten Ekberg, William Li, Eric Berg, Robert Lustig, Rangan Chatterjee, Tim Spector.
Next big thing to take care of is stress, then moderate exercise, then good sleep.
And stay positive - stay alive - be grateful everyday for life, for all that is beautiful, all humanity, and all that can be. Take time to relax, to help others, to de-clutter one's mind.
Has eating become an addiction ?
Simplest, and very effective, method is called daily fasting - don't eat 3-4 hours before sleep, or 3-4 hours after waking. This will put the body's build / repair phases back in balance.
With Wei's Travel ...
Bonus film - with Walk East - Bund night walk, looking across the HuangPu river to PuDong ...
Bonus film 2 - with Gecko Walks - LuJiaZui ...
With Dr. Sten Ekberg ...
BB's summary : Variety, natural, and not too much.
Would have been nice to have a discussion on what vegans or vegetarians should be careful about, the importance of gut bacteria / the microbiome, the timing (limited window for eating), and how people are not all the same, but it is generally correct.
Bonus film ...
Firewood, rice, oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar, and tea 柴米油盐酱醋茶.
Apollo (YT) : The main focus of this video is salt. It is perhaps the most essential of the seven items important to Chinese culinary life: firewood, rice, oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar, and tea. LiZiQi shows how salt is refined traditionally in SiChuan, an inland province of China : salt water is extracted from a well, concentrated by boiling in a big pot with firewood, purified by adding soybean milk to remove colored impurities (which float to the top and are skimmed off), and further concentrated to give salt crystals. She then used the salt to prepare/cook a variety of food, including PiDan (a kind of preserved duck egg with a very unique flavor), hand-beaten beef ball (so elastic that it could bounce like a Ping-Pong ball), potato, stewed beef, and more ...
Bonus film - LiZiQi, on white radish ...
A garden within a garden : )
Dr. Mark Hyman & Dr. William Li.
"I never get tired of saying it: real food heals. Food has the power to prevent and reverse disease, and the more we know about it, the more power we have to curate a targeted diet to help us reach our health goals. The catch is that we have to choose the right foods, the ones that elevate us, and simultaneously ditch the poor-quality ones that harm us. There are powerful compounds in foods— like curcumin, genistein, catechins, lycopene, resveratrol, quercetin — that have medicinal impacts on the body. That’s why I call the grocery store the drug store; we can literally eat our medicine at every meal.
My guest this week on The Doctor’s Farmacy, Dr. William Li, is here to tell us all about eating to beat disease and making the idea that food is medicine second nature. You may also be surprised to find out that angiogenesis, or how the body forms blood vessels, is a common denominator in creating optimal health. William Li, MD, is a world-renowned physician, scientist, speaker, and author of Eat to Beat Disease: The New Science of How Your Body Can Heal Itself. He is best known for leading the Angiogenesis Foundation."
Bonus film - Can we eat to starve cancer? (Angiogenesis) - Dr. William Li ...
Bonus film 2 - more about diet and cancer - Dr. Mark Hyman talks with Dr. Jason Fung ...
Bonus film 3 - on cognitive decline and the real causes - Dr. Mark Hyman talks with Dr. Dale Bredesen ...
Bonus film 4 - GI health (IBS, etc.) plus the differences between standard and functional medicine - Dr. Hyman talks with Dr. Todd LePine ...
Lastly (for now), Dr. William Li discusses the amazing power of plant nutrition and health ...
喝的是茶,过的是生活
Thousands of years ago, a magic leaf traveled worldwide from China. And this year, around Grain Rain, I went tea picking before the best season is gone. Then I roasted green tea and scented some with flowers! For me, drinking tea is as much of high art as everyday life-- that's the essence of inclusiveness. 【李子柒 LiZiQi】
A beautiful film by LiZiQi - don't miss it ...
A mild-flavored winter radish usually characterized by fast-growing leaves and a long, white, napiform root. It is similar in appearance to fresh horseradish but packs a lighter peppery punch similar to watercress. Unlike other radishes, it is as good cooked as it is raw.
A very beautiful film and culinary masterclass with LiZiQi 李子柒.
Dishes include SiChuan pickles, NorthEast sauerkraut and several types of XianCai, salty side-dish, and SuanCai, sour cabbage, with spice and without. Similar to Korean kimchi - Korean is one of the 56 ethnic groups in China.
Don't miss it ...
Rimo Z :
0:23 Rapeseed flowers
2:50 White Radish
3:37 Carrot
4:31 Chinese Cabbage
6:03 Mustard, then dehydrate the vegetables
7:58 Smear chilli sauce
8:28 Sealed for 1 month
8:51 Pine leaves for smoking the meat (Bacon)
9:03 Orange or clementine
9:10 Pomelo on the tree
9:22 Start smoking the sausage and meat
9:30 Add the pomelo and orange peel to enrich the flavor
10:16 Add salt and chilli powder, start pickling the dehydrated radish and carrots
10:36 Dried fish
11:58 put the dried fish, sausage and meat (or bacon) for boiling before eating or further cooking, this step helps to clean the food and reduce the salt
12:47 stir fry with ginger and then start stewing with green onion and orange peel
13:34 Fermented pickle cabbage (non-spicy)
13:49 Fermented pickle cabbage (spicy)
14:06 Minced meat with oil, spice powder, green onions, soy sauce, ginger and 14:14 hot oil to increase the aroma
14:26 Chop the pickle Chinese cabbage
14:38 Mix the minced meat and pickled cabbage, start making dumplings
15:53 Cut the salted meat, stir fry with green onion and stew with the dried vegetables
15:52 Add spicy pickled cabbages
16:16 Add some hot oil on top of the pickle dishes to excite the fragrance
16:42 Cut the boiled sausage, salted meat etc.
17:49 Looks like rose tea
17:55 Just white congee
米老鼠 : Kimchi first appeared in the book of songs. It was interpreted as sauerkraut in China. Korean kimchi originated in the Tang Dynasty. Tang Dynasty general Xue Rengui was assigned to Korea (today's Korea) by the government to settle down in Korea. Many of his entourage were from Jiangbei County, Chongqing, who could make kimchi in his hometown. Since then, Chongqing kimchi has entered Korea. Several wars in Korea have brought this kind of dish into Korean civilian families. Kimchi went through several stages before it became the real Korean kimchi. The first stage is the Three Kingdoms period, when the pickled dishes or radish, cucumber, etc., introduced to South Korea after adding leeks and other fresh vegetables. In the second stage, in the Korean period, the production methods began to be enriched, and the raw materials were added to the base. The third stage is that cabbage has become the main raw material, which is what we eat now.
Persimmons taste like no other fruit. They have a silky, slippery texture and taste kind of like the fabulous fruity love child of a mango and a roasted sweet pepper, with some cinnamon in the background. They are rich and tangy and sweet, all at the same time. --- TreeHugger
May the red, red persimmons bring you a happy, prosperous New Year !
愿一串串的红柿子给大家带来新一年的柿柿顺心 ❤️
The pomelo (Citrus maxima or Citrus grandis) is the largest citrus fruit from the family Rutaceae and the principal ancestor of the grapefruit. It is a natural, i.e., non-hybrid, citrus fruit, native to southeast Asia.
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