The Weird Stuff - Jinzhou & Dalian, China

I grew up eating the weird stuff, and it never seemed strange to me. But I decided to use this title because so many others still cringe. Well haters are always gonna hate, hate, hate, so I'm just gonna shake it off. And with every bite, I remind myself that they're just missing out.

The Donkey Dumplings sound crude, like it's one step down from horse meat, but in reality, donkey is even better than pork. The ground meat has a coarser texture, but it has all the savor of fatty pork except it's gamier and lean. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little grossed out at first, but this Jinzhou delicacy made an ass out of my apprehensions.

I gained a lot of insight this trip, and maybe the Pig Eye helped. This was once a favorite, but it took 25 years to work up the nerve to try it again. The eye is fatty and almost creamy, adding to the oily goodness of the already delicately melty head and face.

Check out all the glistening fat on the head. Trust me, it's worth a try.

Every part of each animal has a purpose in China, and every little bit serves its purpose well. Beef Tendon is another excellent option among the "weird" meats, soft, smooth, and non-grossly gelatinous when soft-boiled in soy sauce. You can't go wrong with anything over-the-counter.

Pig Ear is becoming quite the trend in American fine-dining, but the Chinese are way ahead of the game. The chewy skin is heavily-sauced, maintaining the full texture of cartilagenous crunch, which U.S. chefs seem hell-bent on hiding. It's also a great contrast to the soft, grainy slices of Liver.

Skin really is a great organ, and Garlic Pork Skin is best served cold. The shreds are delightfully chewy, and the pungent garlic perks it up.

I love my meat, but Squilla is still my favorite seafood. The love-child of shrimp and lobster, the firm, juicy meat, especially when there's a hard stick of roe in the middle, is worth pricking all your fingers while pulling back every painful segment of shell.

I grew up speaking standard Mandarin, so standard that no one can tell where I'm from. The Chinese-American accent certainly contributes to the confusion, but I'm most often told I sound like a Rosetta Stone cassette. Each region has their own accent, dialect, or drawl, and the Dalian dialect is harsher, with a different swing. Spoken mostly by cabbies and sometimes by salesgirls, I have always heard the difference and found it impossible to understand. But this time, for the first time, it started to make sense. I spoke my standard Mandarin and they spoke their Dalian-ese, but it didn't sound so foreign anymore. For the first time, Dalian is starting to feel like home.