Sour Grapes

花生汤 -hua sheng tang, peanut soup, originally uploaded by mook elliott.

This soup, peanut soup, is delicious. In my minds eye it was kind of a turn off, images of bland peanut gruel, descriptions by fellow bloggers of “peanut snot”, and so forth… but it is a regional breakfast specialty of Fujian and so deserved a try.
I “found” this bowl outside of the small central market on Gulangyu. The vendor, and his oral hygiene challenged best friend, set up every morning as of early (6 ish) until about 10:00 am or so. His best friend provided the entertainment, yakking to customers, bossing people around, smoking, etc.. while the vendor dished up the soup. Sweet, quite watery, light, and great with a bit of yu tiao (the greasy donut stick in the picture) dunked in it. Certainly worth a try if you run across it and a nice light breakfast.

The most famous place to try peanut soup (Hua Sheng Tang) in Xiamen is “Huangzehe Hua Sheng Tang Dian” which is on Zhongshan lu and is a bustling cafeteria like establishment. I never managed to go there as whenever I stumbled by it was just too hot outside to contemplate peanut soup.
Unsurprisingly perhaps Hua Sheng Tang seems available in SIngapore (much Fujian/Hakka/Hokkien immmigration) with the addition of “yuan” or round rice dumplings.. yipee for Singapore (and Malaysia as well sometimes).

Originally a way to spice and preserve meat through drying, this is rendang more in spirit than in fact. Real rendang is much dryer, being cooked until the sauce has broken (ie rendered it’s fat) and the meat has begun to fry instead of stew, some recipes rendering the meat jerky-like for prolonged keeping. Nonetheless this recipe produces a rich dense curry with a great blend and balance of flavours.

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