When I lived in China, I would sometimes have a 油条 (yóu tiáo) along with my bag of hot soy milk for breakfast. A 油条 is a long, oily fried bread that you eat with your hands. It’s really good.
Whenever I would buy it, the vendor would always tell me that I shouldn’t eat it with an egg, and then she would laugh. I thought this was some sort of joke, but I never actually did eat an egg together with the 油条. Then, I went to a completely different vendor on the other side of town, and I was told the exact same thing—don’t eat your 油条 with an egg.
I was tempted, but never actually did try combining the two forbidden breakfast foods. I have a couple questions for my Chinese readers, or for aficionados of Chinese culture:
- Have any of you had an egg with 油条? What happened?
- Do you know why it is that I’m not supposed to eat them together?
- Is it out of some legitimate concern for one’s health?
- Is it a cultural superstition or a convention of some kind?
- Is this not even a thing? I mean, I might have misunderstood, or it might have been a huge coincidence.
