SZECHUAN CUISINE

There are eight great cuisines of the Chinese traditions. Anhui, Cantonese, Fujian, Hunan, Jiangsu, Shandongm Szechuan and Zhejiang. I am not very familiar with the rest but many people agree that any Cantonese dish tastes good and so many people who had tasted their cuisine agreed that it is among the greatest! Apart from the ease of finding Cantonese cuisine in this region of Southeast Asia, Szechuan cuisine is also widely available.

The earthquake that occurred in Szechuan reminded me of a dinner I took at Mutiara Hotel, Johor Bahru few months back. The place is called Meisan Szechuan Restaurant. It has one of the nicest traditional Chinese interior designs I can find in Johor Bahru. There have been recommendations from friends that the food there is top class. We had the famous spicy sour soup, the Mapo dofu (beancurd and minced meat), the famous fried mantou (bun), tea smoked duck and the very interesting yutiao water chestnut dessert.

The soup gave a great starting point to the dinner as it stirs up your appetite to eat. The mixture of spiciness and sourness is just nice.

The mapo toufu is well-cooked to give it a great balance between the amount of beancurd and minced meat. Unfortunately, most hotels or perhaps all of them in Malaysia does not serve pork so this dish could not reach that peak of taste that pork can achieve.

I love the tea smoked duck dish the most. The mantou is so crispy on the outside and extremely soft inside, I am loving it! You can just eat it just like that and they smell so nice.

Just look at the details of the mantou!

The yutiao is provided separately so you can choose to add the amount you like.

The dessert is very interesting indeed. I had no idea initially how they are going to make a water chestnut and yutiao combo as a dessert dish.

By the way, those who wants to donate to the earthquake victims of Szechuan can do it via Red Cross Singapore. I did my part, I'm not bloody rich but I hope my contributions can help at least one poor kid to eat for a month.

Disclaimer: This post has nothing to do with Red Cross Singapore. It is just pure coincidence.