Food quality in China through a laowai’s eyes

• Source: Global Times
• [21:33 June 11 2009]
• Comments

By Richard Burger

Part of my daily ritual in Beijing during the warmer months is to devour one or two freshly peeled mangoes before heading to work. Mangoes are high in antioxidants and all sorts of natural health benefits. Or so I thought, until a report from Greenpeace issued in April caused me to wonder about the safety of any produce sold in China.

The report said that various samples of fruits and vegetables from Chinese supermarkets, including the huge mega-markets introduced by Europe and the US, contained overly high levels of pesticides. Eating some of these foods, Greenpeace said, was “like drinking a cup of poisonous cocktail.”

Obviously there are many different sources of produce in China, and some may use excessive pesticides while others, like the many organic farms here, do not. Still, this poses what Greenpeace called “a nationwide problem.”

After I read the report, I did what I think most of my friends and colleagues here would do: I kept on eating my mangoes, and pushed the thought of pesticides and poisonous cocktails to a portion of my mind where I wouldn’t think about it. Sure, I take the safe approach and wash everything carefully. But you can’t dwell on it too much.

To me, the report was like those announcements we see every week about the particulate matter in Beijing’s air. It’s something we note with discomfort, and then proceed to live our lives the best we can with the air and the food that we have around us.

I may feel annoyed that the government has not taken better control of the environment, but I have to admit, that’s followed by a what-can-you-do sense of indifference. We live here, and we have to breathe the air and eat the food.

I remember being in a local restaurant in Beijing’s charming Tuanjiehu area last year and thinking how tasty the fish was. Then, as we left the restaurant, I got a good look at the fish tank in front of the restaurant. The water was so full of fish they could barely move, and the water did not look appealing. I even saw what looked like a dead fish floating at the top.

This made me think about the Japanese sushi restaurant I like to go to in Beijing, where it says prominently on the menu, “All fish shipped in daily from Japan.” After looking at that fish tank, paying the extra price for truly fresh fish seemed like it might be worth it. (Then again, if I went there for dinner every night I’d be bankrupt in just a few weeks.)

It’s something we in China always have to deal with – the question of whether our food is safe, and how much we should worry about it. I sometimes have a craving for a snack at odd hours, and one of the things we foreigners love about Beijing – and just about any Chinese city, come to think of it – are the roadside grills that cook the beloved yangrouchuanr – lamb kebabs on a wooden spit, grilled over coals after being dusted with irresistible Xinjiang spices. Along with being incredibly tasty, they are dirt-cheap, usually pennies per kebab. I can have a full meal of 10 chuanr for a mere $2 or so.

I figured it had to be safe, since it’s grilled right in front of you, which kills all the germs. And then my former boss, who’s been living in Beijing for 18 years, told me I should never order chuanr off the street.

“What could possibly be unhealthy about eating grilled lamb,” I asked incredulously.
My boss-turned-friend looked at me and said very seriously, “What makes you think it’s really lamb?”

Ever since then, I think twice before I start eating lamb on a skewer, thinking of what might have been used for my snack. My friend noted, however, that such doubts applied to the vendors on the street, not the legitimate restaurants. And to my knowledge there have been no reports of this practice, so I will put this one in the “hearsay” category.

But it also raised larger questions that we expats in China think about often, namely: How much of what we see is genuine? Meaning, is that dish really what the menu says it is? The

Chinese are absolutely brilliant in the art of imitation (among many other things), so we’re used to being handed counterfeit money and being sold jiade (fake) products. So how do we ever know what we are actually eating?

Maybe we can’t always know for sure. But again, that doesn’t stop us; we eat the lamb and enjoy it. It’s a complicated mixture of feelings, perhaps a blend of “when in Rome,” combined with “what can you do?” and “a man’s gotta eat.”

You want to be sensible of course, and discriminate when you shop for food and buy from restaurants and markets you trust.

But when it comes to food in China, you sometimes simply have to leave your doubts and questions and fears at the door and dig in. That, or go hungry. And most of the time the food is fantastic.