(In)authentic Kunming treats

This post is more of a celebration/excuse of the fact that I've finally downloaded some decent Chinese input software, so blogging will take less time now!! Simon - 很感謝你的幫助！

I'm still eating very well in Kunming, still not sick of the 米線 yet! But I ate some quite special things in the last 2 weeks, thought I would share.

The first would be unappreciated by most who read this blog except for maybe my dad, who I guess will show it to my mum, because this is right up her street. My homestay mum brought home some Chengdu chicken feet 成都雞腳, from a really famous place in Kunming (I forgot to ask the name). Even me as an uneducated non-雞腳 eater was lapping it up! You buy it with the sauce separated from the 雞腳 - I'm guessing it is this magic sauce that made it so tasty (laced with MSG no doubt):

The Kunmingese are also always telling me that their version of roast duck 烤鴨 is better than even the world famous Peking duck. And you do see ducks hanging out to dry everywhere you go in Kunming (poor vegetarian Chirag was a bit shocked when I was showing him round!), and they are so bargainous, around Y17-20 each! At first sight, it looks a lot like Cantonese roast duck:

Mmm, looking at that pic makes me hungry! As you can guess, I wholly endorse the 昆明烤鴨!! Admittedly, the ducks are as skinny as anything, and there is not much meat on them, but the skin is sooooo good, crisp, and not quite as fatty as the Peking version. Our dog 毛頭 refused to eat any of his other dinner after I threw him a few of my duck bones.

During our little tour around Kunming, Chirag dragged me to KFC (or 肯德基 as it known here). I have actually been meaning to go and check out the local specialties for a while (in the name of research for work, of course). The most popular thing going seems to be their deep fried crab claws (Y9), so I tried some:

Hmmm - not bad, but not great either - obviously they have padded out the crab with a ton of flour and MSG, I'm more disturbed at how many crabs it took to make this new promotional item. They also had purple sweet potato egg tarts - it sounded too disgusting to try, especially as they were Y5.50 each, compared to Y1 normal egg tarts!!

We also ventured to McDonald's that day, to try their localised desserts (very few other localised items unfortunately). I was pleased that they did not serve apple pies, but instead had red bean pie, sweet taro pie, and also pineapple pie (Y5 each, or 2 for Y7). We tried the two former ones, and I report that the sweet taro is very good!

But given that the KFC/McDonald's trips more or less used what normally is a week's food budget here for me, not going there anymore!! But I should remember to go to McD's in Hong Kong for their sesame ice cream!