Vitamin Water and drinks from China

I'm usually not a fan of "colored" water but Vitamin Water actually taste pretty good.
My only gripe is the caffeine content of the yellow one called "Energy". According to the bottle, there are 50 mg per 20 oz. bottle. The aftertaste isn't all that pleasant, either, compared to other Vitamin Waters. I didn't have a concept of how much 50 mg is and I had found out from here that a Coke classic has only 34 mg per 12 oz. I know that this means Coke still has more caffeine per oz. but I'm want more after finishing 12 oz. whereas I don't like to leave the 20 oz. Vitamin Water sitting there.

Enough about that, other flavors I have tried and liked:
Name: Multi-V. Color: White. Flavor: Lemonade
Name: Focus. Color: Pink. Flavor: Kiwi Strawberry
Name: Power-C. Color: Red. Flavor: Dragon fruit

Even if the water is called Vitamin Water, it really doesn't contain that much vitamins. I suppose it's better than most beverages which has no vitamins, but Vitamin Water is completely artificial, from flavor (no juice) to nutrition content (added vitamins to water?).

When it comes down to it, I just like the taste. Water gets boring after a while and nothing tastes better than sweetened water that has a pretty color and a funny story (the website has some, although different from the ones on my bottles) attached to it. Of course, it's rather overpriced at our food courts. I usually buy the boxed variety (less flavors, and contains the dreaded "Energy") and try the other flavors randomly when I have too much money to throw away. I remember liking the oranged colored one (Essential) but dislikeing this tea flavored one.

Speaking of drinks, I have to give a shoutout to some drinks I loved during my summer in Shanghai.

康师傅茉莉清茶 Master Kong's Jasmine Tea. light, with just a tint of tea flavor. After you start drinking this (barely any sugar added), you'll never drink Master Kong's green tea or red tea anymore (way too sweet due to sugar content).

康师傅大麦香茶 Master Kong's Barley Tea. At first I didn't like this because I was never a huge fan of barley tea. Later I started to appreciate its taste because it's not sweet at all.

乐百氏脉动青柠 Mizone Lime Sports Drink. Also comes in orange and peach flavors. Lime is the only one worth drinking though. After a hot summer day out (and Shanghai is hot), this is the best drink to recharge. Iced, of course. Someone told me this is the Propel of USA. I was so excited I bought a box of Propel. They're clearly not the same. Propel has some kind of artificial sweetner whereas Mizone doesn't. Although if you ice Propel, it's somewhat tolerable. Never drinking it unless I absolutely have to, though.

三得利乌龙茶 Suntory Oolong Tea. Another favorite, especially if you like the hot Oolong already. Suntory also makes great beer (better than Tsingtao, but don't tell crazy Tsingtao lovers that). In fact, there are many beers better than Tsingtao, which tastes too sweet for me.

Avoid the orange juice type beverages in China like the plague. If you're spoiled by fresh squeezed or even Tropicana, don't buy any orange drinks. You may get lucky at a fancy restaurant and get fresh squeezed orange juice. but don't count on it. Of course, there's also coke and pepsi if you are not feeling particularly adventurous. I was so sad they didn't have Cherry Coke and so angry that the mint flavored sprite (sounded like a good idea) gave me a sore throat. Diet Coke is also catching on in China if you're interested in that.

Simply Thai Shanghai Xintiandi

Simply Thai
http://www.simplythai-sh.com/simplythai/index.html

Why a review for a Thai restaurant in Shanghai and no Chinese restaurants? Well, I was impressed by the food and drink there. Also, it marks my last dinner at Shanghai of summer 2006, a time to celebrate 10 weeks of wonderful time in Shanghai. Well, on to the review, the real content of the blog.

Drinks:
1 cocktail (at $5, or 40 RMB) and 2 mocktails (30RMB or so) and one Thai ice tea

• Pink Pussycat: gin, pineapple juice, grapefruit juice, grenadine. I can't remember the ingredients and I found a bunch of different recipes online.Sweet, pretty, light drink. http://www.cocktaildb.com/recipe_detail?id=3551
• Cinderella: sweet and sour, I think the lemonade is coming through?
• Johnny Appleseed: ice cream, apple juice, and some other stuff

update: okay, apparently $5 is not really that big of a deal, I've seen cocktails for $5.50 near Columbia University.

Food:
5 dishes

• Fish cake: fried, but light.
• salad: forgot the name, it was too long anyway. spicy, but not due to peppers. surprisingly raw scallions really do kick!
• green curry chicken: the best green curry I've had, ever! DC Thai food has got nothing on it. perfect coconut milk and spices, we didn't waste a drop. In fact, our waitress reminded us to order rice since we needed something to eat our curries with. What a smart woman, I think I had 3 helpings of rice. Okay, so I was hungry, too!
• beef with coriander: cilantro, coriander, 香菜, whatever you call it, is amazing. they cooked the beef very well, so that you can smell and taste the coriander with it. of course, my favorite part of the whole dish was the crunchy texture of the cilantro stalks. Gotta get that recipe...
• some sort of noodle: it was tasty, and you could add stuff to it, like peppers and peanuts

Atmosphere:
we had an outside table with nice candlelight.

Service:
the waitress smiled a lot, which is highly unusual in China.

china and food

well friends and fellow food fans,
real Chinese food is amazing and I have a stack of 30+ restaurants' business cards. However, for the longest time I've had issues with blogger, maybe it's revoluntionary in this country like wikipedia and bbc.
I will review some of my favorites when the internet connection is more stable.
as for the Chinese title for my blog, I decided to scrap it all together. As much as I care about posting Chinese characters, I'm sure only 3 or 4 of you can read it, and that is if 3 or 4 people even read this blog.
I started this blog as my own reference guide, and a guide for fellow DCers who wonder about DC restaurants. I don't see any need to do elaborate entries about anything else or language and culture.
well, actually...there's a lot to write about on Chinese food. look out for later entries!
feel free to send in your reviews and links!

p.s. I may actually miss Shanghainese food when I go back to the U.S. Gasp!

Shanghai Ref

[food]
http://www.xuhui.com.cn/
http://sh.sina.com.cn/eat/index.shtml
http://www.dianping.com/shanghai

[night]
http://www.smartshanghai.com/scripts/index.php
http://yuyintang.com/

[maps and transit]
http://map.baidu.com/

[other]
http://goqibao.com/
http://www.centralpark.online.sh.cn/