Ma la Bong Fu

Ma la Bong Fu
See more images by timbeckenham at flickr.

We recently returned from a Chinese New Year trip to Huangshan in Anhui Province of China. I'm going to write a more detailed entry soon, but here's a little snippet of what we encountered on our first night away from Shanghai.

After arriving at our hotel close to 10pm, and feeling hungry, we made a straight line to the closest restaurant. We were ushered into a local haunt not far from our lodgings and proceded to order from memory. No English menus in Huangshan! One disk every expat knows is 'Ma La Doufu' or 'Spicy Tofu'. Its delicious, made with chilis, small shreds of pork and silken tofu. However, we weren't quite prepared for this restaurant's variant - Ma la BONG fu. Why Bong Fu you ask? We all picked it straight away that it didn't taste right, and wondered how to describe it. Lin, speaking out loud described it as tasting '... earthy, no, like dirt. Hey, it tastes like bong water'.

Ma la doufu (tofu) with stinky tofu? Yuck. I don't recommend it.

Ma la doufu will never be the same for me.

This isn't quite what you expect when you order a meal in a Chinese restaurant, but there you go.

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