Kevin, friends, et al

If we can momentarily feed an unfair stereotype: We scribes of the sports pages are particularly good in a couple of areas -- watching sports and eating food. If you've read any of the previous posts, you're aware of the sports part. As first reported exclusively on Elizabeth's Large fabulous food blog -- Dining @ Large -- we now address the food part.

Sadly, we cannot offer the definitive guide to Beijing cuisine in this space. Charged with the most grueling and time-consuming assignment at these Summer Games -- covering Michael Phelps and his eight gold medals -- we’ve had little time for culinary adventure. Much of our dining has come in between assignments and interviews in the first-floor cafeteria of the Main Press Center. As Kevin would attest, McDonald's is one of the more popular options -- for both American and foreign journalists. During the past two weeks here, there are a couple of meals that stand out.

We arrived for a Phelps-related appearance this week an hour early, certain that our cab driver would get lost, as every other one had. Oddly, he didn’t, so we had an hour to kill and wandered into a restaurant called Fat Mother for lunch. It was a hot pot restaurant and there was a hole in the middle of our table with a burner beneath it. Once we ordered our soup broth, a pot was placed in the hole and it wasn’t long before the soup inside started boiling. We’d innocently ordered a chili soup, thinking we could tackle the fiery challenge. With red peppers floating, the soup looked very much like a thin lava. We’d soon learn that it tasted this way, as well. The Fat Mother staff brought trays of food to our table -- mushrooms, spinach, beef, prawns, potato noodles, ham. Using chopsticks, we dumped or dunked our food item in the soup, allowing it to cook sufficiently before pulling it out, cooling it off with a peanut dipping sauce and partaking. It was relatively easy to eat -- mostly because after just a bit of it hit your mouth, your tongue went instantly numb. Like I said, we mistakenly ordered the lava soup. The heat never seemed to cool. We went through a pair of Cokes apiece and I had a pile of about a half-dozen crumpled napkins that had tended to my running nose. The eyes and antennae scared Kevin from even biting into a prawn, but he didn’t want to hurt Fat Mother’s feelings, so he dunked half the slimy critters into the bottom of the soup. We had a sense of accomplishment from dipping into the volcano in the middle of our table and bragged to many people throughout the day. Unfortunately, only three or four hours passed before my stomach began to rumble. It felt like a troop of 12-year-old Chinese gymnasts were performing deep inside me. Needless to say, Fat Mother left a lasting impression.

We’ve had a couple of meals here that cost in the $25-$50 range. But my best meal came from outside of Beijing and cost about a dollar. Visiting the Sechuan province, devastated by an earthquake four months ago, we stopped and ordered a bowl of noodles from a storefront restaurant. We ate on a picnic table set up on the sidewalk. The noodles were in a spicy broth -- tolerable but noticeable -- and also had parsley and a fried egg. The flavor was thick and soothing, hitting your nose long before the chopsticks even reached your mouth. The meal was packed with superlatives: For this trip, it was the cheapest meal, the biggest serving and a taste I’ll dream about back home.

There's virtually no tipping here. And beer can be cheap, if you're into that ($1 at some sports venues; which is quite a bit different at M&T Bank Stadium). Plus, the food is fresh.

We visited part of the Great Wall before the Games began and stopped at a nearby restaurant after. Kevin ordered a fish dish and the staff didn't have to look far. There was a cement pond near the parking lot with a couple of dozen fish inside. Before long, Flounder went from a gay afternoon swim to his spot as a centerpiece on our table. This restaurant, like many here, featured family-style dining. As a rule, I don't eat food that's staring back at me, but Kevin still claims this as his best meal in Beijing. Of course, Kevin's been so busy on the Phelps beat, that he has little to compare it with. The fish is No. 1 in his book; the McDonald's value meal is No. 2.