When I’m on the road in China, this is a typical meal out. It cost 50 yuan for two people, which is close to $7 US. The meal seen above is from a simple restaurant in Chengdu, Sichuan’s provincial capital, where I was late last week.

There are four dishes. My favorite is called “Ants Climbing Trees.” It’s the dish you see my office assistant, Fan Linjun, sampling above. The dish has rice noodles and little bits of ground pork. Best I can figure, when you use chopsticks to pick up noodles, the bits of pork look like little ants climbing up a tree trunk.

The big soup bowl contains “Sour Vegetable Fish,” a tangy freshwater fish in broth. Behind it is “Three Frangrances Bean Curd Flower,” a soft tofu dish. The greens are “White Oil Vegetable.” I couldn’t figure out what kind of greens they were. That is often the case for me in China.

I prefer to be with native Chinese when dining out at Chinese restaurants. Menus are generally massive, with lots of local specialties and odd names.

Ants Climbing Trees, anyone?