Shanghai Variety Show

I don’t know if this is the actual name of the restaurant, or if it’s just the name on the paper placemats. The food here is pretty tasty, although the service is horrible. But the restaurant is only a short walk from the hotel, so we’ve been here a number of different times.

Egg custard with clams, and pastries with radish and ham:

The jielan (Chinese kale) here is really really tasty, and we’ve ordered it nearly every time we’ve come here. Also pictured: pork cooked in a Shanghai style with a type of vegetable (plum vegetable) that is eaten inside steamed buns, mochi (nyangao) with dates, and sweet shaved ice topped with peanuts.

The mall near Jinqiao Metro Station has a very tasty restaurant, and we’ve eaten dinner there twice. The food here is from the same region that Chairman Mao is from. We had soup that had been cooked for 5 hours in a large earthenware pot, extremely soft tofu served with a variety of seasonings, sticky rice (ground up so that the rice is finer than couscous) with pork that falls apart in your mouth, a vegetable dish that’s a mixture of carrots, mushrooms, and peas, and rice donuts that reminded me of the chips my family would get with chicken when we ordered Chinese food from Daniel’s Place.

Pizza Hut

Pizza Hut is much fancier here than in the US, or at least that’s my impression given that I’ve never been to a Pizza Hut in the US. The menu here has wines and steaks, as well as very asian drinks, such as a matcha slushie. I had a corn drink with boba that was surprisingly very tasty.

Carrefour Supermarket

Carrefour is a chain establishment. The one on Biyun Road is two stories tall. The first floor has a lot of restaurants/food places, some of which are set up like a food court. The second floor is like a gigantic Target, about two times larger than any Target I’ve been in. There is stationary, clothes, shoes, and a very large food section. I couldn’t find any milk, but there is a large selection of soy milk and yogurt. Some of the more liquid yogurt comes in soft pouches (below), but there are a variety of types, including yogurt that is dense like Greek yogurt. Some of the food, like baby formula, has a separate section for imported products.

There is a very different selection of fruits and vegetables than in the US, and there’s also a selection of live sea food… and some live other things, like frogs, crawfish, and eels. Wenrui told me that the frogs are a more Southern Chinese thing. Carrefour also has a very large selection of bulk dry goods, including beans, seasonings, rice, and teas (visible in the background of the first photo below).