Hello Steemians, let's continue the tour of a Chinese supermarket! This may seem like a strange thing to write about but it's a different world over here. Maybe you'll see some differences from your own country. Especially if you are from America or Canada.
Last time we saw the fresh meat and seafood sections, as well as the frozen and chilled area. You can check out the first post here!
Let's begin:
It was hard to get a quality shot of the whole baked goods section. As you can see, individual packaging is a big thing here in China. This is not just a thing at Walmart. I'll buy a box of cookies and I'll have to unwrap each one before I eat it. I guess it's a good way to control your eating!
The last photo is a picture of "mooncakes". These are typically eaten for mid-autumn festival in October. There are fillings such as egg, nuts, date, jujube (not the candy. It's a fruit that tastes like apple), and hawthorn. There are also fruit flavours like strawberry and such. The best tasting one is the mixed nuts in my opinion.
One more thing to point out - the megaphone sitting on top of the mooncakes. Those megaphones are the bane of my existence here in China. A lot of marketing for clothing stores and other retail shops will use loud speakers to get their message across. This wouldn't be a problem but they put them on repeat and loop them every 2 seconds. It drives me f**king crazy!!!
Anyways, let's continue on our tour of the bakery:
More individually wrapped packages. These are crackers. You can get a whole lot of em for about $3 a pound.
So you can get normal sliced bread here like whole wheat and white but most of the other bread is very different from the west. I find the bread here to be extremely sweet. Almost sickeningly so. You won't be able to find sourdough, rye, or multigrain bread at Walmart. Bagels and English muffins are nowhere to be seen as well.
Above you can see some cakes and cream puffs. That's about where the similarities to the west end. You can see some cream filled creations above but there are also these meat and fruit things that are like mini pizzas. Unfortunately, they are smothered with mayonnaise. At the bottom of the display case, you'll see other buns that usually have meat floss or tuna floss on them. That's another word for tiny pieces of dried shredded meat or fish.
The last photo is of egg tarts and they are delicious. You can find them almost everywhere in China. For a dollar or two, you can get 4 of the tasty morsels.
Let's start with the cooked meat! Just like back in Canada, you can buy rotisserie chickens. They'll chop them up neatly and put em in a package for you. What is even cooler is you can buy yourself a duck. It'll come with mini tortillas, some cucumber, some long onions, and some sauce. For a while, I was buying these for my after gym meals but it got a little too greasy.
Next you'll notice that there are various organs and other unsavory looking parts of animals on display. The bottom picture is of chicken feet marinaded in different sauces. Chinese people don't waste any part of the animal.
Living in China for 3+ years, I've eaten intestine, hearts, ears, kidneys...even chicken testicles. I must say, I'm really not a big fan but I'll try it once.
Here we have the cold noodle station. They'll give you a few veggies and some sauce and mix it all together. A refreshing meal for a summer day.
Under that is the salad station. Doesn't look much like typical American salads does it? There are some street food vendors who have a salad setup like this but they also have bugs as an added shot of protein. Mmmm mmm!
Last, we have a woman minding her own business when a foreigner comes up with a camera and takes a photo of her. I'm sure she is thrilled. Actually I included this photo because of the purple and the orange chips on the end. The purple ones are taro chips while the orange ones are sweet potato chips. A great healthy alternative to potato chips and they taste delicious!
Pickles!! I've never seen such an assortment of fermented items. I've only tried one of them and it was pretty good.
Next is the hot noodle/friend rice station! While probably not the healthiest, these are some of the tastiest!
Okay this post is getting a little long again so I'll stop here and we will continue on to the produce/bulk section next time.
If I had to compare a Chinese diet to back home, I'd say overall they eat a bit healthier. Though most of their food is drenched in oil, they have some healthy options for snacks that are less processed. Then again, they eat a sh*t ton of bread here - I've seen people eating whole loaves for breakfast. Who knows!
Which country do you think has the healthiest diet?
Chinese Supermarkets are a wonderworld in itself.
Where I am around there is no Walmart. We have RT-Mart and hypermart but the insides are pretty much the same. The individual packaging really freaks me out. I just want to eat 1 kg of flavored nuts and not waste a year worth of plastic!
Best are the apple cider beauty drinks and of course the Baozi corner with freshly made delicious bakery.
Lol I know what you mean about the plastic. It seems really strange. I guess it keeps things sanitary though.
I used to have an RT-Mart in my old city. That is a super Chinese supermarket. It's humongous and probably has the winningest bakery out of all the chains.
Honestly, I think I would get very fat living in China. I would probably avoid all of the healthy foods and just eat the carbs. I forgot to mention this in my comment on part one, but the bao that you showed looked amazing. Eddie Huang the Chinese American chef has a restaurant in New York called baohaus that I have wanted to go to for a very long time. It's really interesting to see the differences between here (Canada) and China. I hope this becomes a regular series with more similar stores/establishments.
Nah I don't think you'd get fat. Though the first few months here I ate nothing but baozi (stuffed meat buns) and dumplings lol. Icecream and candy are also super cheap so I wasn't the healthiest and I did put on a bit of weight. It was to the point where I was traveling with friends in Inner Mongolia and a stablehand who takes care of the horses at the ranch we were at (who I didn't know) came up to me and patted my stomach and laughed. After that I started hitting the gym. The reason I was getting fat was from the convenience though. You can order food at the push of a button and a guy on a scooter will come hand you your food, no tips or anything.
Welcome to Steemit by the way!!
Japan maybe?I heard the portions they serve in the restaurants there are small,so you can't really stretch your stomach and eat too much,quite smart and healthy!Plus of course lots of fish, which is the best thing to eat, sushi and misoo soup hehehe But I love cold noodles here,even though it's too many calories 😬😬😬😬Nice post,thank you for sharing!😊
Japan is the first one that comes to mind for me too. I felt pretty healthy when I was eating there. Yeah China has it's noodles game down that's for sure!
Did you like Japan overall?Is it more western than China?
Japan is one of my favourite countries. I can't rave about it enough. It's quite a contrast to China. It's a lot more peaceful and clean. You'll rarely hear any horns (people use their low beams and high beams to communicate while driving instead) and the people are extremely polite. There is even classical music and nature sounds playing in the subways (or at least in the cities I went to). Yes, it's far more western but it's also retained it's culture. The history is well-preserved and they have their own identity. I really recommend you to go there! The food is also amazzzzing.
I would love to go there sometime!When I was little, Japan was the country I wanted to travel to and explore,their culture is very special,I hope one day to I'll manage to see it myself)))
I am delighted. Thank you for continuing to write.
Thanks for reading.
Hi @eitsky! I love everything in this post! Also, eating is one of the best hobby I can never get tired off ^_^.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who considers eating a hobby. I love food.
Looks so good, I am hungry already.
Haha thanks for stopping by. I wrote this to give Canadians and Americans some contrast but this probably just makes you miss home.
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The duck with tortillas is called Peking Duck !
Yes :) but it doesn't compare to the restaurants so I didn't want to call it that. It is delicious though. Thanks for stopping by.
Nice supermarket..thank you for share information
Thanks for stopping by.
You are welcome
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