Fermented and fabulous.
16 fl oz of ginger kombucha fizzling in my tummy, Saturday afternoon steaming outside the coffee shop on M Street, random thoughts turn toward the ubiquitous in China and MIA in America fermented soy bean paste that I learned to love.


I became most familiar with the stinky yet wonderful paste as a condiment added to Kunming's famous rice noodle soup, but the more I learned to actually register the things I saw on a table the more I saw it appearing in common culinary practice.

Bean Paste is but one fabulous fermented delicacy that lingers on my tounge years later. Fish sauce, and the much stronger purple paste whose name I've forgotten, are also loved by natives even as foreigners cringe at the very smell.