It does a Bai good!

The other day, I was idly wondering what the common Chinese expression might be for "cream-coloured". After all, that colour must exist everywhere. But what would a culture in which the colour of cream is not common knowledge use for comparison? When I found the answer, it was so blindingly obvious that I had to chuckle at myself: 米色 mǐsè "the colour of husked rice".

"Rice" was also the answer to the question monshu and I had about what Chinese infants were traditionally weaned on. According to a book I have on the customs of Old Beijing, "steamed rice-powder", a kind of finely-ground rice flour, is cooked into a pap and rubbed on the baby's lips; Lin Yu-tang calls this preparation 奶糕 nǎigāo or "milk cake".

Beijing is, however, one of the few parts of China where dairy products are actually part of the local cuisine and this book, The adventures of Wu : the life cycle of a Peking man, includes in its run-down of popular street snacks a description of a milk-based dish called 酪 lào. The preparation is as follows:

Whole milk is heated and sweetened in a big pot over a brisk fire to boiling point and then a few drops of rice wine is added. Be it an organic-chemical reaction, the alcoholic content of the wine will change the density of the milk and, to a certain extent, solidify it. Bowls of this stuff are iced before being served. (p. 168)

Sounds rather like a form of quick-setting clotted cream, doesn't it? But the author, H .Y. Lowe (Lu Xingyuan), goes on to add that the cows "are all put on a special diet of sour dregs left over from the manufacture of Chinese vinegar by fermenting rice".

Do you think anyone in Beijing still makes the stuff now that Western-style custards, biscuits, and cream buns (not to mention White Rabbit Creamy Candy) are so easily available? That's one of the questions I plan to answer. The Wikipedia article on Beijing cuisine lists a dish called 奶酪 nǎilào (glossed "Beijing cheese") which may be the same thing. I'm also hoping for my first taste of a dish made with 奶湯 nǎitāng or "milk broth", a sauce base I've been curious about ever since I first saw it used on Iron Chef.

To my surprise, cooking with milk is not exclusive to nomad-influenced Northern cuisine in China. monshu went out and bought a more in-depth guide to dining in Beijing which lists several ethnic restaurants specialising in the dishes of non-Han minorities from Yunnan province. One of these dishes is 乳并 rǔbìng, which every reference I can find (apparently all cribbing from the same source) describes as "goat milk cheese, from Bai cusine in the area near Dali". I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised, since that is in the very backyard of the those yak-butter-tea-swilling Tibetans, who are related to the Bai (although exactly how closely is a matter of dispute).