DJs Do Dog Meat

I recently did a proper restaurant review of Lao Tan, which is a Guizhou minority food restaurant near Logo bar in Shanghai. While we don't come here specifically for the strange foods they have on the menu, there are a few worth a weird meat mention.

Allow me to quote myself, "Some readers might pass on the Bamboo Worms (48rmb) or the Fried King Bees (60rmb), or even the delicious Grilled Dog Meat (45rmb)..." There's also Cow Hooves and Pig Intestines and Chicken Feet.



The menu is also chock-full of chinglish doozies like "Old Alter Speculation Dumplings," (very good, like Italian ravioli) "The Pot Green Pepper Young Lad Chicken," (which we assume means a young cock? rooster?), "Jew's Ear Frying with Leek," (not many Jews in China, so this is very expensive... Joking. What is Jew's Ear?) and "Lao Lao Murphy" (will try that next time).

We've been dining here frequently because we really like the food here. Guizhou food is known for its sour flavors, and that's not an understatement -- it can get really really SOUR. But in a good way. I think this stuff is great for hangovers, something about the sourness seems to help, but I can't verify that scientifically. The sour flavor, like the numb flavor of Sichuan food, causes us to salivate excessively, and that feels good when you've got cotton-mouth.

Recently we dropped in for a hangover-cure lunch with Mr. Knifehandchop, who we invited to China to play music at our party. After 2 nights of rocking Beijing and Shanghai, Knifehandchop was ready to try some dog meat. Unfortunately he lost his camera the night before, so there's no photographic proof. We ate the sauteed dog meat. It was well-done, in a dark brown gravy, served in a clay pot with garlic, and there was a lot of jiggly fat on the meat. A lot of Chinese dishes are like that, especially "fatty pork," which can sometimes be 90% fat. This was no lean dog! The meat was probably 40 or 50% fat. Jiggly fat. You shake it with your chopsticks and it goes "whoooba whoooba" like a firm jello. Reminds me of some of Knifehandchop's songs.



Since we didn't get any pics last time, I had to double dog dare some other DJ friends into dining on dog meat. Actually it wasn't a dare, cause these guys had dog before. This time, Kid Fresh (DMC world champ from Germany) had his iPhone and even though he's a vegetarian, was kind enough to snap some shots of the dog eaters, including Mr. Stokes (DJ from USA), B6 (Chinese DJ and producer), and myself (just a DJ groupie, from USA). The dog meat was fatty and chewy, and someone made a joke that we were eating a fat bitch, but then the waitress spoiled it by informing us the dog had a penis.



Read more about eating dog meat here.

(If you have comments about eating dog meat, there's already quite a lengthy debate on our last post. Say what you will, but can we at least request the courtesy not to use profanity, because that just gets your post deleted.)



Incidentally, it appears you can order dog meat (and cat meat!) from this company. Or is it a hoax?

Another good article on dog meat, and an honest response from a Western chef.

New Year's Resolution

Years ago during a drunken new year everyone was chatting up their resolutions, the usual stuff, getting more exercise, eating healthy, blah blah blah. I couldn't handle it. I announced that I was going to pick up a new vice instead of a virtue.

So I tried smoking cigarettes. I never had before, so it felt exciting and enjoyably reckless, but it only lasted 2 weeks. I found it a to be a chore, going to buy smokes, trying to find that lost lighter, having to wash clothes more often... I just got lazy about it and after those 2 weeks of being a smoker, I sort of forgot to get around to it.

I still try to pick a new vice every year, if for nothing else, to get some laughs in the middle of those annual resolution (yawn) chats at the office. In subsequent years I tried pot smoking (lasted longer than 2 weeks but still didn't really get into it), eating more red meat, eating more cheese, drinking more red wine, eating more chocolate (this is probably the only resolution that's still going strong after years), being more of a perv in bed, petty shoplifting, reading comics, playing video games, staying up all night once a month, gambling, leaving restaurants without paying when the food and service totally sucks... and one year I chose to "eat more weird meat" and that eventually turned into this blog.

I missed the deadline this year. I couldn't think of a vice I hadn't done yet. Any ideas? Leave a comment...