Some Like It Hot

Tonight as I watched my brother-in-law, Matt, whip up a delicious chicken concoction involving frying things in one pan, taking them out, frying other things in the same pan, putting all the fried things together in the same pan, etc., I heard him make the comment, "I wish we had one of those heating lamps, like at McDonalds." After my verbal, "ewww" and the non-verbal "ewww-what-are-you-thinking" look communicated by sister's face, Matt responded, "What? All restaurants have them. That's how four plates come out at the same time, and they're all hot."

And then I realized one of the reasons I like eating at American restaurants. You see, I have a little blood sugar problem. There is a very strong correlation between my blood sugar and my mood. Low sugar = possible imminent homicide. High sugar = high flying fun + head ache to follow. Eating something my mother would term as "decent" at least three times a day = a fairly pleasant Anna.

Here's how my borderline hypoglycemia relates to why I like American restaurants. You see here, I don't have to choose between being a good person and food. My food may be able to wait patiently for me under a heat lamp in the kitchen until all the plates for our table are whisked out to the dining area where we can all commence devouring our dishes together. But I have an extremely difficult time waiting eat if my food is just sitting in front of me and mere politeness dictates that I may not touch a single morsel. Any American restaurant worth its trendy organic sea salt will spare me the choice between looking like a jerk for eating in front of someone, and looking like a jerk for killing someone because they got between me and my food. Thank you America, thank you heat lamps.

This is not so in China. Here's how group meals go in China. You arrive at the restaurant with your people, normally at the busiest hour and without a reservation. You inform the tired, surly hostess that there are eight of you. She informs you (the one with the rapidly falling blood sugar) that you're going to have to wait at least twenty minutes for a table. Since the rest of the people in your party are normal and aren't afflicted with a persnickety metabolism, they say that a twenty minute wait won't be a problem. For the sake of group harmony, you pretend the same thing. After an annoying half hour of watching other people slowly finish their delicious food and then linger at the table a while, digesting before they leave, you are all finally seated.

Now it is the task of one, or possibly two, people at your table to order. In a traditional Chinese restaurant, ordering dinner is a fine art. In China, dishes typically do not come in a neat little entree package with the chicken, potatoes, and vegetables all portioned out on your plate like they do here in the States. If you order a plate of kong xin cai (heartless vegetable), that's all that's on the plate. Just a big, heaping mound of kong xin cai. Hardly a full meal. Same thing with the ma la shu tiao (numb-spicy french fries), yu xiang qie zi (fish-flavored eggplant), and the gong bao ji ding (kung pao chicken). Ordering then, means that one must choose dishes so that the perfect balance of flavors and textures; meat and vegetables is achieved, all while taking into account what your group is (probably) in the mood to eat and pay for. Order up everyone's favorite song shu yu (sweet and sour squirrel fish). Make sure there are vegetables, eggs, and tofu in the mix so that the vegetarian doesn't starve. And, the most important after thought, don't forget the rice. The waitress will then ask if it's OK to bring the food out now. What a ridiculous question.

From there 's just a waiting game. Fortunately in China, you usually don't have to wait long for the first dish to come out. Five to fifteen minutes is usually all it takes, a fact that perpetually amazed me since the ordering to entree time in the U.S. is usually a good twenty minutes or more. Twiddling your chopsticks and exchanging pleasantries while looking forward to the arrival of the first dish isn't the real waiting game though. No, no. It's only after the arrival of the much anticipated, long awaited first dish that the true test comes, the second fact that perpetually amazed me: no one acknowledges the existence of this food; instead, everyone pretends it's not there. No one picks up their chopsticks. The conversation continues as if nothing has happened. The people at the table who aren't me won't even spare the food a longing glance. There's a plate of mouth-watering pai gu (short ribs) sitting in the middle of the lazy Susan and everyone is ignoring it!

I call this part of the meal the "sit-and-stare-portion," mainly because I sit and stare at my tea cup, using all the self-control I can muster to be polite, culturally sensitive, and NOT descend upon the food like a ravenous wolf. Everyone else at the table continues talking and ignoring. This is not because they aren't hungry or because they dislike what was ordered; rather, it is because they were well raised. You see, their good Chinese mothers taught them that a good person is civilized and refined, not greedy and rude. A civilized person will be well fed, thus making an edacious descent upon the food both inappropriate and unnecessary. Furthermore, they will have a palette refined enough so that the thought of eating only one dish at a time is disagreeable. After all, whoever ordered your meal meant for the dishes to work together and complement one another. It would be insulting and distasteful to eat them one at a time.

After the second or third dish finally makes its way to the table, one or two of the group members might bring it to our attention that, hey, the food is here. A mixture of relief and desperation washes over me. We're almost to the eating part of the meal. There's just one last awkward detail to take care of: who eats first? A good, civilized person would not hungrily take the first bite of a meal for themselves; rather, if they should happen to deserve it, that honor will be bestowed upon them by the other members of the group. Modesty dictates that they refuse this honor (ideally two to three times) and try to pass it on to someone else. Eventually, after lots of polite, "No, you eat first!"s, everyone will come to a consensus about who should begin the feast.

As soon as that guy's chopsticks touch the food, everyone else makes their move. The lazy Susan starts spinning, the chopsticks go in like hungry sharks, and for the first time in about an hour I realize that I'm eating with friends, and that I don't want to kill them all. My blood sugar begins a steady rise. My countenance clears. I decide China's not so bad after all and enjoy the rest of the meal.

Maybe we don't need those McDonalds heat lamps after all.