I'LL TAKE MY MENU IN PLAIN ENGLISH PLEASE
yesterday for lunch Julie and I went to P.F. Chang's. It is a fancy Chinese bistro. Anyways, we were trying to go light, so we shared an entre and an apetizer. Julie pointed out one small dish that she really wanted to try. It was tuna. It was described as being 'pan-seared,' seasoned with some sort of chinese spices, and served cold with spicy mustard* I didn't realize what any of that meant, so I simply drew upon my past experiences of eating tuna: open a can of tuna, drain water (or oil), snatch up a fork, enjoy. [optional serving between toasted white bread and Miracle Whip] Yeah, I'll have that tuna...i love tuna.

Some time goes by and I forget what we've ordered and they bring out the appetizer. It looks oddly familiar...but not like tuna. It actually looks like some sort of beef filet cooked medium/rare. And i mistook it for that until i rememberd that it's tuna. Hmmm. Cooked lightly around the edges, red in the middle. "Isn't tuna white," i thought to myself.

So it turns out that pan-seared in chinese = RAW!!! My face immediately turned a few shades lighter as I imagined putting UNCOOKED fish in my mouth. But I tried it anyways. To my surprise it was really good. I couldn't, however, get over the fact that it was raw fish. it kind of made my skin crawl.

The way the fish was cooked and seasoned, it never tasted like you were eating raw fish...that is until you caught a whiff of your breath in the back of your throat [many call this the 'aftertaste]. It was so distinct that it took me to another place. A place where all kinds of animals are held in cages for people to look at. the zoo. The smell emanating from my insides was the same smell that you are blown away with when you enter the penguin house. It smell like that because every few hours or so a woman [who much to my delight looks just like a penguin] comes out of a back room and starts feeding the penguins raw fish.

Overall, it was a good experience, and Chang's has very good food. I had salmon for dinner, and you can be sure that I cooked it all the way through.

*What is it with everybody and mustard. This stuff is gross. Even adding spices, honey, whatever, it still tastes like crap. I had mustard presented to me in about 3 different ways yesterday. Each one tasted like paint. Doesn't anybody realize that this is the same stuff you put on hot dogs. I don't see ketchup being offered in new ways at expensive restaurants. These people are crazy.