No 1: Ningxia

Last week I had the inaugural meal of my ‘eat the food of all China’s provinces challenge’. I was joined by my friend Cissy, a fellow food blogger (check her out at www.grazingbullock.blogspot.com) and her boyfriend Andy who I think found the idea of this challenge faintly ridiculous, but humoured us and came along nonetheless.

We started with a humdinger, Ningxia.

Before I crack on talking about the food, here are my top ten facts…and not at all courtesy of Wikipedia… about the great province of Ningxia:

1) It is a classified ‘autonomous region’ like Tibet, Guangxi, Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang, which means, in theory at least, it retains a degree of independence from decrees passed down from Beijing
2) Both the Yellow River; China’s second river after the Yangtze as well as parts of the Great Wall pass through the province
3) It is 1,200 from the nearest sea
4) Its capital, Yinchuan, is home to the International Car and Motorcycle Tourism Festival…whatever that may be
5) Wolfberries, which are eaten extensively in western China and made into all sorts of teas and Chinese medicines are mainly produced in the province
6) Ningxia is mainly desert, meaning the population is relatively low at 5.8 million
7) At 66,000 sq kms, it is slightly bigger than Sri Lanka, oh yes indeed
8) An earthquake in Ningxia in 1920 killed an estimated 200,000
9) It is 34% Hui nationality (Chinese Muslim) making it one of China’s most Muslim areas.
10) In 2006, satellite images indicated that a 700 by 200-meter fenced area within Ningxia is a near-exact 1:500 scale terrain model reproduction of a 450 by 350-kilometer area of Aksai Chin bordering India,
complete with mountains, valleys, lakes and hills…but nobody knows why. Strange.

So, now we all feel thoroughly educated, to the food!

When I told my Chinese colleagues I was going out for Ningxia food, there was a lot of sad eyes, shaking heads and one or two ‘whatever for?’ type comments. It seems the traditional food of the province is not held in particularly high esteem by the sophisticates of this nation’s capital, but I was not put off and we subwayed our way down the Andingmen station near the Beijing drum tower and, complete with a Google map found our way to the Ningxia Mansion, a typical Chinese, white tiled building plonked in the middle of a hutong alleyway and muslimed up with a faintly ridiculous mosque style roof.

Once inside, we were shown to the dining room and despite my concerns that we had not made reservations found ourselves in a large banqueting hall, only two or three tables of which were being used. From the chandeliers hung the remains of party poppers, obviously there has been some kind of party – record wolfberry production rave maybe? Or perhaps it was a celebration to commemorate the 2 month mark before the 2009 International Car and Motorcycle Tourism Festival? Who knows.

Our waitress, who seemed ever so slightly scared of us – I don’t think she had ever had the delight of serving three slightly sweaty foreigners a cross section of Ningxia specialties - helped us order some and then all of a sudden our table started filling up….

At this point, apologies are in order. Silly me, I didn’t write down the names in English or Chinese for any of the dishes so am going to have to rely on my dazzling writing skills to get across what we ate.

First came a large plate of what can only be described as tasteless dough sticks, rather cleverly twisted into a jumble of ‘U’ shapes but which would have benefited from some salt, or at the very least a sprinkling of MSG. Still, we managed to nibble on them till the rest of the food arrived, trying to decide whether the after taste was of petrol or merely cooking oil.

To accompany this…ummm…delight we ate a small plate of cold salty chicken, which was a lot more tasty than it sounds. Succulent chunks of chicken in a salty, spicy light sauce, most of it still on the bone.



Some stir fried bitter mountain vegetables cooked in a simple 'qing chao' style and a large plate of very tender mutton chops which appeared to have been boiled were also consumed with an incredibly garlicky dipping sauce



, but my favourite dish of all, and one which I am definitely looking forward to eating again was a plate of fired mutton, garlic and heaps of cumin which we were instructed to heap into tiny boiled mantou bread parcels before devouring.



Upon leaving the restaurant, reeking of mutton and cumin, I think we all agreed that although the food was better than expected, it wasn’t mind blowing. I did enjoy it, but then again I enjoy most food…perhaps we ordered wrong? Perhaps the restaurant was not all that great, but put it this way, a trip to sample the delights of Ningxia cuisine is not going to become a weekly occurrence in my social diary.



Still, live and learn…on to the next challenge. Watch this space!