Food! Glorious Food!

If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; Proverbs 25:21

Before I came to China, my big joke was that I was going to become a vegetarian here! The reason I said this ws due to my first grocery store experience here last June. They had meats that were cured hanging around. Picture a good Italian Deli , mulitply it and then add very unique things hanging there too! The best was watching people picking out their own pieces of meat from the big pile (yes they used gloves!).

Fortunately, the store I shop at is not quite to this extreme!

We have a WalMart Super Center in LangFang. In there, the meat department however is very "open". We are used to foods being prepackaged. I can get that here but it is more expensive and not as many choices. The rest is either laying on ice or in an open refrigeration unit and you pick what you want with tongs. It is like a bulk department but with meat! After you bag up what you want, you take it to get weighed and labeled. Purchasing a whole chicken though will never be the same for me.

(Trying to put a picture here but can't figure it out! To be posted later!)

Now picture getting that head in your dinner! Been there! Done that!

In China, they waste NOTHING! Everything can be used for something so you will find unique things in the meat department!

You can even get your chicken nuggets in bulk in the frozen meat section!

(Will add another picture once I can figure out how to move them!)

So far I am sticking to the things I am familiar with and comfortable with. I imagine I will get more adventurous as time goes on.

Wegmans better watch out though! They have bigger meat, produce and bakery departments with a much wider variety. It is easy to eat healthy here. If you are really craving certain Western foods, Beijing has several grocery stores carrying imported foods. I can even get my favorite Rold Gold pretzels there...if I want to pay $5 a bag!