Da Bu Tong

Da Bu Tong / Not The Same
Corner of Nan Ma Lu and Wenhua Gong Jie
Hohhot
Inner Mongolia

We actually ate at Da Bu Tong both nights in Hohhot. They have a pretty good reputation for different varieties of broth and lots of ingredients to put in your soup! The first night, we got a crazy hot mutton broth, and sliced beef, mushrooms, hand-stretched noodles, and dishes of cold peanut sauce. Actually I had no idea what was going on with the peanut sauce, but our waiter was really insistant that we got something-something that the other people were eating, so I agreed. It was a perfect complement to the hot flavour of the broth.

We went back the next night for the typical half hot/half sweet broth. This comes in a soup pan divided like a ying-yang pattern, with one half holding a white chicken and cilantro broth and the other half holding red spicy broth. This time I managed to get the spongey tofu (Anyone know the Chinese to specify sponge tofu over smooth tofu? ‘Cause it seems totally random to me), a different kind of mushroom, and of course, more hand-stretched noodles. Is there anything those noodles can’t do?

I think the spicy broth and peanut sauce combo was a little better than the half-and-half one, but I actually had a better time the second night because we were tucked into a corner instead of of being seated in the middle of the room. A cormer means only 90 degrees of staring, while a central location means 360 degrees of watching the foreigners eat. We saw very few westerners on our entire trip (some German backpackers at Dazhou temple) so the staring is only natural, also it wasn’t hostile at all. Still, I do feel more comfortable without the attention of the entire restaurant.