Old China Hands lunch 7 April

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Back to good numbers

Our Old China Hands lunch 7 April saw improved numbers with 33 attendants. Some people had forgotten about the lunch, but apologized.
We managed to have the service of the restaurant under control as it struggles, as many other restaurants, with shortage of staff.

Time flies, we will celebrate our 10th anniversary of “OCH” during the next lunch, planned for Friday 5 May. Chef Renaat will do a special lunch menu and there will be a surprise artistic event! I hope to see full house.

As always lively conversation and great food.

The famous OCH

Mark continues to flood the media, e.g. about the heartwarming birthday party thrown in Beijing for 75-year-old Mark Levine, an American sociologist, writer, country musician as well as the winner of the Chinese Government Friendship Award. How does he sing his China stories to the world? Again another media post.

But I am also a bit polluting the media, this time with the documentary about the Beijing Central Axis.

On 29 March I was invited to the official launch of the documentary in BRTV. The documentary was aired for several days, I was in the third episode.
I will write a few articles about it later.

Ambassador’s Kitchen in Beijing 4

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Argentinian fusion

Ambassador’s Kitchen in Beijing 4 tells about our experience with Ambassador’s Kitchen trying to show some Argentinian fusion. On 9 January 2023 Renaat Morel and myself were invited to join their shooting in the Mango TV building where they have an imitation restaurant. Previously we were asked to be jury members for Belgium food.

We were supposed to walk into the restaurant as normal guests and then welcomed by the host who showed the menu. That evening we were supposed to taste “Argentinian fusion dishes”. At another table as it happened a German friend of mine, Georg, was tasting a Belgian dish. Small world!

The dishes were OK but honestly we did not see a link to Argentine cuisine. The chicken tasted a bit like Hainanese chicken. The staff did do their best however. For me the best was to taste again Yerba Mate tea, did not have it for decades. And in the real traditional cup!
Again big Mango TV team to do the shooting…

What is Yerba Mate?

It is a stimulating drink, greenish in color, containing caffeine and tannin, and is less astringent than tea. Mate is especially common in Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, and southern Brazil as well as in Syria and parts of Lebanon, where it was introduced from Argentina.
Yerba mate is traditionally consumed from a container called a gourd and sipped with a metal straw that has a filter at its lower end to strain out the leaf fragments.
See the benefits here.

Real Argentinian food

I discovered the Argentinian restaurant Malbec & Beef on 24 March 2023, located a bit north of Raffles Clinic, the building with many restaurants such as Bodega, Turkish Feast and others. I found out they were the restaurant where Ambassador’s Kitchen did previously the shooting for Argentinian cuisine.

We opted for the beef, two different ones (sirloin and rib-eye). We were not disappointed.
You won’t find much of a difference between ribeye and sirloin in terms of nutrition, but sirloin does have less fat content as a leaner cut of steak. If you’re watching fats in your diet, sirloin is usually the better option. However, the vitamin, mineral, and calorie content of both cuts are similar.
The small red wine from Argentina was also very good.

As a special gesture from the manager we were treated with a “provoleta”, gratinated cheese, delicious. It is a famous dish as explained here:
“Provoleta is melted provolone cheese, served hot from the BBQ or oven, with a variety of toppings.  Provoleta hails from Argentina. Traditional Provoleta is made with a unique Argentinian type of provolone cheese.”

Ambassador’s Kitchen in Beijing 3

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Competition

In Ambassador’s Kitchen in Beijing 3 I show the cooking competition organized by Mango TV, see the previous post.

Two teams were to compete preparing Belgian dishes, one team headed by Ms. He Chaolian, (Laurinda Ho, youngest daughter of Stanley Ho) and the other with Li Chen, Superstar, famous Chinese actor and director. Location: the Mango TV building north of Taikooli, on 20 December 2022. The Belgian embassy provided a translator.
Jury members were Renaat Morel and myself. They got my Chinese name wrong but that was our mistake. Right is 范克高夫.

Ingredients, cutlery, and other were provided by Morel’s Restaurant.
In a limited time the teams had to make some famous Belgian dishes: Belgian fries, mussels, endive and ham (gratinated), pears in red wine. The pears (“Conference pear”) are from Belgium and have a unique and delicate taste. Some supermarkets in Beijing sell them.

Hands up for the two teams

We were a bit worried how the teams would handle the challenge.
As it turned out, they both did a great job.

It was difficult to nominate the “winner”, we finally awarded the prize to He Chaolian as she opted for the more difficult dish, the endive au gratin.
Again the organization and team work of Mango TV were impressive.
Yes, Beijing life is never boring!

Focus on Belgian beers

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

More to come

I have been writing about it but I am starting a new focus on Belgian beers. More articles are in the pipeline with also an updated list of beers I discovered in Beijing.

Be patient, I am working on a revision of beer-related articles.

Previous posts

See here a look back at previous beer-related posts.

The Federation of Belgian Brewers (104 members) has published the results for 2018: The world biggest beer exporter is Belgium.

Belgian beer in Beijing updated: about import problems (the acesulfame story), Gentse Strop, Stroppendragers, and more!

In Beijing there is plenty of Trappist beer but finding Westvleteren in Beijing was a surprise. Westvleteren is one of the recognized Trappist beers. More about Trappist beers, Chimay and Westvleteren.

More about two beers with Waterloo history, “Cuvée Napoleon” and “Waterloo Beer”. About a small farm called Le Caillou at Ligny, near Waterloo, La Bataille de Hougoumont, La ferme de Mont-Saint-Jean and other stories of Napoleon and Waterloo.

If Belgium is the land of beer, I have been surprised to find so many of them in Beijing. So I started a Page of Belgian beer! Discover in Brussels Delirium Café and A La Mort Subite. How it started near the end of the 10th century to create so much history around Belgian beer.

I should not forget Ghent, my hometown in Belgium, where I was born, grew up, went to school and university. About the history of the Belfort, Gulden Draak, Strop beers, how the people of Ghent came to be known as ‘Noose Wearers’ (“stroppendragers”), and the famous “Gentse Feesten”.

Beijing Workers Stadium story 5

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

The new look

Further to our previous post, in Beijing Workers Stadium story 5 some details on how the new Workers Stadium will be different.
A first glance came out in this article of the Beijinger on 1 March 2022.

It mentioned:

– The original layout of two tiers of seating has been changed to four tiers. Additionally, there will be lounges for fans to take a break from the match and enjoy food and refreshments.
– The reconstructed stadium will no longer have a running track. This means viewers in the lower seats will have closer proximity to the field – 8.5 m away from the action, to be exact. Moreover, around 2,000 seats will be added, bringing the total seating capacity of the stadium to 68,000.
– One of the biggest complaints about the old Stadium was that the narrow old roof just barely covered select seats on the uppermost parts of the stadium, with all other areas left uncovered. That won’t be a problem anymore, as the stadium will be equipped with a bigger roof that can cover the entire stadium, thus protecting visitors at all times, whether there’s rain or shine.
– A new underground commercial space will turn the area into an entertainment venue for people to eat, shop, and have fun. The underground complex will also act as a connection between the as of yet to-be-completed subway lines 3 and 7, with plans to connect the space to Taikoo Li in the future.

China Daily

See the article dated 4 October 2022 – “Major sports venue in Beijing to have new look”
“Beijing Workers Stadium, which was put into use in 1959 and has hosted a range of large-scale sports events – including the first National Games, the 1990 Asian Games and some events during the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics – will have a new look after a major reconstruction project that is expected to be finished by the end of the year.”

The article has more good pics of the construction, here the PDF: 221004 CDgongti.

The New Gongti Complex

Another great article in TheBeijinger dated 21 October 2022.
“What the New Gongti Complex Has in Store for Beijing”
See here the PDF with many pics and the interview with Jin Fei, the vice general manager of the operating company behind the remodel: 221021 New Gongti

“There are three main changes that have been made to Gongti. The original stadium had a running track, but after the revamp, the running track has been removed. Another big change lies in how Gongti will be used. More than 100,000 square meters of commercial facilities have been added to the complex, transforming the area into an entertainment venue where people can eat, shop and dine. The new stadium also features a giant underground plaza which soccer fans and fitness enthusiasts can explore.”

Above some pics of the 7 January 2023 article mentioned earlier.

Beijing News 20 August 2020

The online article in Chinese has some remarkable pictures.
Here another article dated 7 August 2020.
See here a few of the pics

The pics in this post are pretty unique!