Gritty and ugly, elegant and mysterious, monkeys crawling on rooftops overlooking crowded city streets, Sikh temples, red clay mosques, poverty and sickness, beggars in the streets, serene parks, gracious hosts, outrageously good food…Delhi is a city of incredibly diverse character- an international mega city where travelers can be found in great numbers. With a population of over 13 million people it the second largest city in India (after Mumbai) and there are dozens of indigenous ethnic groups and religious cultures from all parts of the country who can be found here. Mix in the ex pats, and a thriving tourist business, and you can see why Delhi is a pretty potent cultural masala. From some of the best restaurants in the world to humble everyday cafes, the Delhi food scene represents the national cuisine.

Of course I hit Bukhara, named by Restaurant Magazine as the best restaurant in Asia, it is a favorite of rock stars, presidents and royalty. The place is a must do for any restaurant aficionado or anyone with the need “to be seen” and the food is exquisite, the tandoori is without peer, but I wanted to search the dustier side of Delhi.
So I went to Old Delhi’s Muslim Mughlai cafes, where locals indulge in Nayaab Maghz Masala--mutton brain cooked with curd and curry, Kalije, savory liver and kidneys, Gurda-Kapure--kidneys and testicles, and Nalli Nihari, a spicy stew made with buffalo marrow, feet and skin.
I vsited with Joy Banerjee the genius chef of Oh! Calcutta--a modern, upscale Bengali restaurant in South Delhi. He is an expert in Bengali food, and something of a celebrity in India for specializing in the old family recipes of a bygone area. Bengal's culinary traditions are based on the rich selection of grains, sea food, spices (a custom blend of nigella, black mustard, fenugreek, fennel, and cumin seeds), and produce, mostly bananas. It was one of the best eating experiences of my trip. The banana is extremely popular in Bengali cuisine mostly because it is convenient. Abundant throughout Bengal/West Bengal due to the humid heat and fertile soil, every part of it the plant, from flower to trunk is edible. After watching the complex preparation of each banana specialty that includes peeling the banana tree trunk, exposing the heart of a foot long blossom, and stuffing the leaves, I feasted on Bengali dishes like sautéed tree trunks, fish bathed in mustard oil and wrapped in banana leaves and Mocher Ghonda— the dish made with foot long banana flowers.
If you really think about it, milk is bizarre. Why humans thrive on that white secretion from the mammary glands of the female cow is curious at best; nonetheless, it is revered, especially in India. India is the largest producer of milk in the world. In addition, milk has long standing symbolism as a purifying and cleansing agent. There’s the “sacred Cow” revered by the Hindu who make up 82% of the population and in a city as diverse as Delhi, where religious values demand adherence to exclusive diets, milk is one of the only items common in Indian homes across the nation. From main dishes to specialty drinks and especially sweets, milk plays a huge role in Indian cooking. But not all Delhiites are comfortable with the suspect processed version you buy at the supermarket. Instead they rely on fresh milk from the cows down the street. Yes, in one of the largest cities in the world, the milkman keeps his own cows in his house and delivers milk daily. They milk the cows into a couple large cans, hang them on the milkman’s bike and off they go. I tagged along and at the last stop on his delivery route; the milkman introduced me to a neighbo. I watched as she blessed her small shrine by bathing it with raw milk to ensure a holy beginning to the day. Then she showed me some of her favorite milk recipes- like Lassi, a frothing whipped yogurt curd drink, a cream sandwich, and meat gravies made with curds. The we went on a tour of her favorite sweet shop where we sampled Kulfi, the Indian ice cream that comes in a variety of flavors like rosewater, pistachio, saffron and vetiver (a native grass), milk starch & rice noodles served with crushed ice, cheese balls in sweetened milk, sugared fruit & sprouts, creamy yogurt with saffron & pistachio nuts, curd and chickpea donuts, pastry balls made with milk & honey in a thick syrup, and crunchy orange-flavored cottage cheese that looks like a spider web. Awesome.

Delhi is the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world going back at least 2500 years. The ruins of 7 cities have been discovered here, and it is said that Delhi’s food is often descended from that of the mediaeval lashkars garrisoned around the forts of the capital. But today, Shahjahanabad, or Old Delhi is home to an army of office-goers and shopkeepers who trade in everything from spices to bridal trousseaux to electrical fittings. If you venture to untangle the streets that twist and turn from dark alleys into busy boulevards, you are likely to find an inevitable surprise lurking around the corner, at least that’s what my new pal Hemanshu Kumar, a college Economics professor who is also the titular head of Eating Out in Delhi, a local club always in search of the most interesting and most bizarre food in town. Today, The Professor and I went on a search for the nearly extinct and increasingly overlooked traditional foods that can only be found on a dedicated filed trip. We found spiced milk froth, tiny Nihari stands, and anything else that popped up, like fruity sandwiches that reside in a shop behind large iron gates on Chawri Bazaar Road--- made from pomegranate (anaar) or apples and paneer (Indian cottage cheese made from curdled milk) lathered in orange marmalade, then dusted with secret masala and anaar seeds all on white bread.

Food and eating are a very strong element of each and every Indian culture. However, the one thing that brings most people together often becomes what keeps people apart here in India. In other words, culture and religion in India can visibly separate many Indians from each other, especially when it comes to food. Some eat meat. Some won’t even allow meat inside their homes. Some fast as a way to be close to god, others say fasting is the path to weakness and therefore for evil. However, there is a place where all cultures, all religions, all walks of life can sit side by side and share a meal and that is at the Langar of the Guru Dwara or the kitchens of the Sikh temples. Sikh culture promotes non-violence & vegetarianism. They are strong believers in Karma, and attribute Karmic values to everything they do, including the air they breathe, the water they use, the light of the sun and moon they take in, and the food they eat. Sikhs are considered the most egalitarian society in the world. At the langars or kitchens anyone can volunteer to cook, and more importantly anyone can eat for FREE. No one is ever turned away. This is a community service. Serving between 8 and 9,000 visitors daily, with no division between a lunch and dinner hour, it’s always mealtime at the langar. And everyone who enters here understands that this food is an offering from god; therefore, it is a place of community, and for some a spiritual experience. I got to volunteer in the langar preparing the basic staples for the community---Dal, Roti and vegetables--then I dined with about 4000 of my newest friends. Amazing. But still not the most outrageous meal of the trip.
In Kashmir, eating is considered a beautiful and sacred tradition and is an all sensory experience. Kashmiri cuisine is as much about art, style, and ritual as it is about the food. Influenced by a rich history of Persian, Afghan and Central Asian influences, this cuisine is lavish, decadent, and plentiful. There’s also a custom, and perhaps even passion, for hospitality: In Kashmir, it is said that the host should lay out all the food that he has at home before his guest. The guest, on his part, must reciprocate this gesture by doing full justice to the meal. Renowned Kashmiri fashion designer Rohit Bal hosted a traditional Wazwan feast consisting of a whopping 36 courses, each course with it’s own tradition and ceremony. Notoriously fun-loving Rohit loves a good party (he is the Isaac Mizrahi of India after all) and there couldn’t be better host for this spirited feast. The Wazwan is a typical feast for special occasions and weddings. The colorful meal is a ritual in itself, the preparation of which is considered an art form. On the menu is fried lotus stems, fried lamb ribs, fenugreek, cottage cheese squares, chilis, sharp radish & walnut chutney, lamb curry cooked in milk, jellied bouillon made from meat and bones, eggplant and apple stew, and rogan josh, a lamb stew made with tree resin, mustard oil basted lamb, cock’s combs, and saffron. I left stuffed and happy, after a 5 hour meal, wandering back to my hotel through the loud and crowded streets, wondering how I ever got myself into this crazy business.

Posted by Andrew Zimmern at 3:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (17)

Few people in the world have a more passionate relationship with food than the Chinese. And thanks to the large-scale emigration of Chinese from the southern province of Guangdong to elsewhere in the world, Cantonese is by far China’s best-known cuisine. Cantonese food originates from Guangzhou, the city that used to be called Canton. Today, Guangzhou’s food culture is known as one of the cuisines that worships unusual foods in China. In fact, a popular saying describes Cantonese food like this: “Anything that walks, swims, crawls, or flies is edible.”

The city boasts the largest number of restaurants per capita in China. Combine that with some of the world’s most innovative chefs and countless rows of cheap food stalls on every street and you’ve got yourself one vibrant food scene. I began my trip with my favorite hallmark of Chinese food, a cuisine that originated in Guangzhou— dim sum. I headed to the best dim sum joint in town, Guangzhou’s most popular restaurant, creatively called the Guangzhou Restaurant. The tea service is quaint and served on ancient carts, the chicken feet are fried to make them puff up, then marinated, then steamed, and served with a black bean sauce. Eating the chicken feet feels like a wad of chicken skin slip-sliding around your mouth, then you spit out the bone. The congee, the dumplings, the noodles and the famous iconic dished created 80 years ago by the restaurants master chefs and duplicated around the world are treats no food lover should miss.
Street food is popular in Guangzhou, especially with the younger crowd and there are three main streets that people flock to for adventurous eating. The steamed buns, grilled squid and shrimp noodle bowls that you see everywhere are delicious.

Many Chinese like to relax with a cup of tea at a local tea house. I went to the neighborhood’s best tea house for a cup of Chinese chrysanthemum tea and a classic desert called double-skin milk. Double-skin milk is made by boiling fresh milk until milk skin is formed. After the milk cools it is separated from the skin. Next, the skin is braised with sugar until you get another layer of milk skin. The braised milk is poured into a bowl, and you have double skin-milk. Caramel-dairy heaven!

The primary components of many Chinese dishes are noodles. At one time, noodles were made by hand in homes and restaurants all over China. Modern machinery has since taken over that process, but I found a place where the art of making hand-pulled noodles is still practiced. And this guy above me is the dude in the show who rolled noodles so thin that he put three through the eye of a needle. At the Jiu Mao Jiu Noodle Restaurant, chefs fold, twist and stretch dough until it separates, as if by magic, into perfectly equal noodle strands. I got invited behind the bar to try my hand at this difficult technique. But making the noodles is half the job. The chef must now turn the noodles into innovative dishes. First off we fell in love with the Cats Paw noodles in black vinegar, and the spicy peanut noodles, fried noodle platters and noodle soup bowls were all flawless. This is a must go of you ever visit this city

Ask anyone who’s been to Guangzhou where the best place to find unusual foods is and you’ll get the same answer every time – The Qingping market. With over 2,000 stalls and 60,000 customers per day, Qingping is the largest street market in Guangzhou. Although it’s well-known by travelers all over the world, it’s not so much a tourist attraction as it is a fascinating look into the local Guangzhou life. That’s exactly why I love markets, to find out what the locals are bringing home for dinner and spend time with real people. A first glance at the market reveals things like dried fruits and vegetables from North China and salty fish from the south. A closer look exposes the infamous meat section where you can bring home just about anything that walks, flies, swims, or crawls including snakes, turtles, frogs, and all kinds of fresh seafood. But the section that peaks my interest the most is the medicine street, full of peculiar foods that will cure any ache or pain. I tried the dried lizards on a stick, used to strengthen the immune system. Next its dried seahorse for strengthening the kidneys. How about some dried deer tail to cure back ailments, or dried extract of tiger penis to enhance sexual virility. And finally, after all those tasty treats, I tried some dried puffer fish, good for digestion which i could really use right now! Scorpions and snakes, why did I ever say yes to this job!

I adore food that is all about “cooking fresh, local, and best.” This theme is the backbone of restaurants all over Guangzhou, and the Summer Palace at the Shangri-La Hotel is no exception. In fact, Chef Jacky Chan prides himself on using only the freshest local ingredients every night at Summer Palace. Known as the Genius Chef, Jacky Chan became the youngest executive chef in Hong Kong at the age of 18. Since then, he’s racked up 31-years of devotion to the art of cooking. With a reputation like that, I was dying to work with such an expert in his field. Jacky showed me how to prepare some of his favorite and most famous Cantonese dishes- the extraordinary and very seasonal hairy crab and his signatures, like sweet braised pork and jellyfish salad. This restaurant is wonderful, and the picture above does not do it justice.

In China, mushrooms are valued as much for their healthful properties as for their taste and texture. The Chinese incorporate a wide variety of fungi into their diet for specific medical purposes as well as for general good health. Chinese doctors have been using fungi medicinally for twenty-five hundred years, calling them the "fruit of the earth." Because of the enormous population in China, hunting wild mushrooms is almost impossible as they have all been overharvested. But there is one spot to find these exotic treats, and to get there, I traveled up into the mountains about an hour outside of Guangzhou visiting a mushroom farm where they cultivate unique fungi like Bearded Tooth, Wood Ear, Oyster, Velvet Foot, King Bolete, and Long Net Stinkhorn mushrooms. After a quick lesson on the tastiest morsels, we picked a bunch and brought them to the countryside restaurant located in the town adjacent to the mushroom field. Here they cook up the freshest mushroom dishes Guangzhou has to offer and the young chef who prepared all these dishes for me was talented in the extreme. Her version of steamed chilled chicken is still the best version of that dish I have ever had.

Guangzhou has seen its fair share of urbanization over the years, but the surrounding villages remain untouched. We made our way to a village about two hours outside of Guangzhou for a look at some traditional Chinese foods and cooking techniques. I love having an opportunity to visit a family who live on a farm and grows all their own vegetables and raises chickens and pigs. It’s a much simpler way of living and everything is guaranteed to be fresh as it’s grown right on their land. This style of life is disappearing all over the world faster than you can say Starbucks but on the menu tonight are some very interesting dishes made from every part of the chickens and pigs they raise. We picked vegetables for the meal, butchered a chicken, netted some prawns and feasted on 12 dishes…as always the meals I share in homes with real people always end up being the highlight of my trip.

Posted by Andrew Zimmern at 1:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (14)

Of all the places I have visited so far this year, Chile is my favorite. You are always only an hour away from snow capped mountains or stunning beach-scapes. The wine scene here is second to none and is easy to plug into, much different than in the USA or in Europe. The countryside is rustic, with teeny beach towns that remind me of the way Malibu must have looked 100 years ago. The people are friendly, the weather is perfect and the food is fantastic. I could live in Chile!

Santiago is an amazing city, great theater, great landmarks, superb restaurants, and a buzzing vibe is in the air, everyone here senses that Santiago is ready for it’s moment. Yet the rustic charms are still easy to find, check out the neighborhood Feast Day fest I participated in if you doubt it. Seafood is everywhere, and the meal I had at Ana Maria or the day I spent at Mercado Central stuffing my face with oceanic oddities is all the proof you need that is truly a seafood lovers paradise. I even found an edible invertebrate called a piure that I had never even heard of, let alone ever saw. The scene that made it into the show is extraordinary. Truly the most bizarre food we have ever encountered. But the parrillada restaurants that specialize in grilling and roasting all cuts of beef are everywhere, and believe me after a few days of eating barnacles, mussels, congrejo, oysters, seaweed and abalone I was ready for some red meat.
I ate my fill on the last day in town, even eating grilled cow udders, a very tasty treat, but the real meat eating lay a few hundred miles inland. So I took off for Fondo Collanco, a 10,000 acre spread a few hours outside of Temuco.

Fondo Colanco is a private ranch that I visited on the day of the Spring castration. We watched about 30 bulls get snipped and then retired to a barn for the day. We stripped the balls from the scrota, taking them to a giant plow set over an open wood fire for searing in oil, garlic, and chiles before parking them between two homemade rolls for hand sandwiches. The scrota were sautéed with onions, tomatoes and wine into a capullo, or sac-stew! After braising for 3 hours they melted into your mouth, heavenly. But the real treat was yet to come. The Mapuche Indians who work the ranch have been there for generations, working for the owners family for hundreds of years, a true feudal system. When they castrate the bulls, they make a sacrifice of 2 lambs. They string them up by their feet, put a knife behind their tracheas and bleed them into a pan. The blood is seasoned with onion, cilantro and lemon and it sets, into an instant pudding. You eat it before the blood even has a chance to cool. While we were eating this dish, called a niachi by the locals, the lambs were skinned and seasoned, put on a rotisserie and hand turned for 2 hours while we ate the ball sandwiches and the capullo cooked. Several salads of tomatoes and avocados were made and then we all sat down, lord and serf, guests and family friends to a feast that ranks as one of my all time faves. Moises and Christina, our hosts, were the kindest, most wonderful people I have met in years, and their willingness to invite me to share not only in the meal, but to see a ceremony that no one ever experiences outside of a handful of Mapuche, was the icing on the cake.

Anyone thinking of taking a break in a beautiful country, steeped in history, with vibrant cities and rolling country side, cool mountains and warm sea ports would be silly to ignore Chile, my new destination of choice in South America.

Posted by Andrew Zimmern at 4:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (34)

Flying into the highest major city in the world is a little bit of a misdirection play. You land at the airport, gasp for air and if you need it you avail yourself of the free oxygen tanks while you await baggage delivery. The 10 minute trip across the plateau leaves you wondering where the heck La Paz is. After a few miles more you turn a corner and begin the descent down into the valley and can see the entire city in one magnificent vista, framed by snow capped Andean peaks and you can’t help but feel a spark of excitement. La Paz is simply thrilling.

Bolivia is an undiscovered country that offers a wide variety of climates, cultures and indigenous foods. The city of La Paz, at 11,200 feet high, is the world’s highest capital founded in 1548. A notorious haven for renegades and outlaws like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and Che Guevera (all of who met their deaths there,) Bolivia is not your average tourist destination. And there are reasons aplenty to talk yourself out of visiting. But even though it’s the poorest country in South America, Bolivia is surprisingly self-sufficient with ample supplies of oil, natural gas and other natural resources. What they lack is common sense leadership that isn’t just anti American but anti anyone! Everyone dislikes everyone else in Bolivia. Discontent seems to be a part of the natural order of things here, but don’t let it dissuade you from checking it out.

The first thing I had to see was the cobblestoned Calle Linares and the famed Mercado de las Brujas, or Witches Market. Witches, medicine women, and soothsayers sell medicinal herbs, llama fetuses, dried frogs and armadillos. Along the street, you’ll find a variety of talismans and old bottles with potions concocted from animal parts like boa constrictor heads. I had a coca leaf reading done to discover what my future looked like and was immediately invited by the two yathiri to attend a ceremony involving the burning of a llama fetus to ensure luck with a new business venture. We got in their car and hit the road to journey up to El Alto, a devastatingly poor barrio that has become the fastest growing city in South America. We stopped and ate some llama jerky, choclo, the local corn that looks like it’s on steroids and the popular Anticucho de corazón: beef heart with peanut-garlic sauce served on a stick. Everyone but me had a cup of coca tea- supposedly it helps avert any possible altitude sickness. Sounds fishy to me. I think aspirin and water works well. Anyway any excuse these guys could concoct to chew more leaf, they took it. I think they reached into a bag every 5 minutes for more, and by the end of the shoot they were electric, vibrating, like mini tin figurines from that old football game where the players wiggle down the field when you turn it on.

I ate the next night at La Casa de los Pacenos, housed on the 2nd floor of an old colonial building which hasn’t changed for decades. They serve cow’s tongue in chili sauce, cow’s stomach, kidney stew, vein soup, penis soup and llama with chocolate sauce. I loved it all. There is a lively restaurant scene in La Paz that combines traditional foods of Bolivia and the dishes of many cultures. Pronto Delicatessen, a more modern restaurant, is known for its “Novo Andino” where the chef prepares traditional foods (llama, quinoa and ispi) that is then influenced by the Eastern technique of combining sweet, sour and spicy…goat ravioli with Asian curry sauce, quinoa spaghetti with coca béchamel sauce. This restaurant is called experimental by some, I call it confused.

La Lucha Libre, is Bolivia’s answer to wrestling as entertainment but with a twist—the contenders are all women who wear the Bolivian traditional dress of a multilayered skirt, white pumps, shawls and traditional bowler hat. The gym where the matches take place is in El Alto, the lower-class district above the capital city of La Paz and I got to watch these colorful wrestlers prepare for their ‘shift’ in the ring. These ladies are tough and oddly sexy at the same time, and they can kick your ass. What’s more I got to introduce them in the ring, a real thrill. Juanita the Caring managed to cheap shot me before the match even began, dousing me with a gallon of cola and sending me ass over tea kettle on to the floor in the resulting melee. Unbelievable.

In contrast to quinoa, which is the super food that Bolivia exports all over the world, the potato which originated in the Andes (there are over 3,000 varieties) and is still Bolivia’s most essential food crop is rarely exported to the States. One unusual variety of Bolivian potato is rotten, black dried spuds. These Chunos or old potatoes are freeze dried in a five day process which makes them look like sugar coated cookies. They are exposed to very low night temperatures in the Andean Altiplano (the high area above La Paz), stomped on to dry them out, then exposed to the intense sunlight of the day. Inside they are black and “nasty”. In this form they last as a long as 25 years. And they all taste that way. I spent a day on Emertrio’s farm which he maintains with the help of his wife and 10 children. They sleep with their livestock, brew beer to keep their cows happy, air dry their own llama jerky, and cook all their meals on a small little clay vessel that they stuff with animal dung and place a pot on the top of the flue. They mostly eat a farmer’s soup of broth studded with vegetables like carrots and onions, rehydrated fava beans called abbas that have been toasted directly on the burning dung for a few minutes before going into the pot, dried llama, and chunos. Lots of chunos. To call this soup earthy is an understatement of dramatic proportions.

Santa Cruz is Bolivia’s most populous city but it has the feeling of a small town with its lack of high-rises and tropical atmosphere. It is a far cry from the Alto Plano. It is hot, humid and is the gateway to the Orient, the Bolivian rain forest. People still gather to visit on the main square and restaurants close daily for siesta. With the largest international community in the country Santa Cruz is not the Bolivia of llamas and cholitas. Instead overall-wearing Mennonites walk alongside bearded Russians, goth kids, Brazilian and Japanese immigrants. We drove south of the city a few hours, stopping along the way to buy achacharu, small tropical fruit that are a seeming cross between a passion fruit and a mangosteen. I ate 4 bags in one day. We dined at a riverside restaurant, well actually it’s a small hut. You order, they go out into the woods, kill what they need to fill your order and return to their endless chuggin' of beer diluted with warm Coca Cola. We ate fish, twice cooked feral pig and armadillo. It was extraordinary.

Regarded by the Inca as the birthplace of their civilization, Lake Titicaca is the world’s highest navigable lake. We ended out trip by heading out to this sacred area to be a part of an Apthapi, or Andean picnic. First, we were invited to a home to help a family prepare their contribution to the picnic. Overlooking the picturesque lake, families gather to eat together, sitting on the colorful blankets of their region. Each cholita brings a different dish. There is Lake Titicaca trout, like no other fresh-water trout in the world and ispis, the snack food of indigenous people in the area, a tiny fish which is fried whole, salted and served simply along with vegetables, quinoa dumplings, home made cheese, broiled llama and chunos. All of the food is spilled out on the ground to be eaten as we crouch by the shores of the lake, trying to stay out of the driving hailstorm that is pounding into us. A shaman burns a llama fetus, we sing a few songs, say some prayers, the elders eat a few fistfuls of coca and the sun comes out. I forget how cold I am, and pile back in the van and go to sleep. I’m stuffed.

Posted by Andrew Zimmern at 2:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (21)