Good account of reasons to avoid the fry-up. I will only have bacon once a week but price-wise it was only 9 yuan a pak. The bread was just 3 yuan a loaf. The main idea for the bacon and butter is for cookery flavours actually. Bacon added to spaghetti and tomato is good for a change from Chinese and not meant to replac.e it, jokes aside.

Being retired has given me loads of time to develop my cooking skills to some extent. I can cook chips, fry/boil eggs, cook mutton hotpot, cook noodles with anything and make toast from steamed bread.

So I can cook some dishes that are Chinese and some Western dishes too.

I'm trying hard to diet, so I tend to avoid fried stuff. Also I am cautious about eating too much meat. When I cook mutton hotpot, I'll consume only 10 -15 pieces of rolled mutton with 8 boiled potato pieces during an average meal.

Rolled mutton costs 28 RMB/500 GRAMS here. That will last me 4 home-cooked meals. It's quality red meat and tastes great with chillis.

In North China you can buy beanzi or baidzi, which you can eat to replace steamed bread for a change. The Muslim one is about 10 or 11 inches long and 4 or 5 inches wide, and thin enough to place in a toaster. Not sweet and something akin to Indian nan bread, 2RMB each.