Tokyo – A 28-year-old man died in Japan after choking on a rice ball at a speed-eating contest, an event organiser said Tuesday.

The man, whose name was withheld, died on November 16 in hospital three days after choking, said the local farmer’s cooperative that sponsored the event in the western city of Hikone.

Contestants competed to see how fast they could eat five “onigiri” balls of locally grown steamed rice, a popular Japanese comfort food.

The man shoved his fifth rice ball into his mouth before passing out and was rushed to a local hospital where he later died, the organiser said.

The contest was composed of three sets of five contestants each.

“We had the first and the second sets finished and were watching the third group when this happened,” said the official at the cooperative, who declined to be named.

Eating contests are popular events at various regional fairs held in Japan to promote local produce and culture, as in other countries where choking deaths have been reported.

Japan’s best known competitive eater is Takeru Kobayashi, who won fame as champion of an annual hot dog eating contest in New York.

After news of the latest death was reported, New York-based Kobayashi tweeted warnings about amateurs trying to eat too much too fast.

DHAKA – Hundreds of Rohingya have arrived in Bangladesh after fleeing violence in neighbouring Myanmar, community leaders said Tuesday, but border guards have pushed back hundreds more despite a United Nations plea to let them in.

The UN says up to 30,000 Rohingya have been displaced by violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, where dozens of people have been killed in clashes with the military, and has urged Dhaka to open its border to them.

Instead the Bangladesh government, under pressure from local communities to limit the number of migrants, has intensified patrols along the 237-kilometre (147-mile) border to prevent a large-scale influx.

But Rohingya leaders told AFP an estimated 1,000 have still managed to get in over the last week.

Most are hiding out in camps for the 32,000 legal refugees already living in southeast Bangladesh, fearing repatriation if they are found by the authorities.

Among them is Mohammad Amin, 17, who said he and 15 others people fled their homes in Rakhine five days ago and reached Bangladesh by swimming across the Naf river that divides the two countries.

“The (Myanmar) army killed my father and elder brother. I hid on a hill and then walked and swam across the river, and took refuge at a mosque (in Bangladesh),” he told AFP by phone from Cox’s Bazar near the border.

“I don’t know what happened to my mother and sister.” State media reports in Myanmar say security forces have killed almost 70 people and arrested some 400 since the lockdown began six weeks ago, but activists say the number could be far higher.

Myanmar troops have poured into a strip of land that is home to the stateless Muslim Rohingya minority since a series of attacks on police border posts last month.

Witnesses and activists have reported troops killing Rohingya, raping women and looting and burning their houses.

Commanders of the Border Guard Bangladesh said their troops had blocked nearly 300 Rohingya from crossing the border overnight, the highest number since the crisis began last month.

“We’re preventing them on the zero line, especially those who were trying to cross the barbed-wire fences erected by Myanmar,” said Imran Ullah Sarker.

He said many were sent back after they managed to sneak across unmanned parts of the border.

Bangladesh is also patrolling the Naf river, the commanders said.

“They told us that their houses were torched and they came here seeking safe shelter,” said one border guard official.

BANGKOK – Thai lawmakers have been asked not to leave the country next week, the head of parliament said on Tuesday, as a much-touted December date for Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn to ascend the throne draws near.

The death of King Bhumibol Adulyadej on October 13 at the age of 88 has left the Southeast Asian nation of 67 million people without a monarch, but Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha has made it clear that the king’s only son and appointed heir, Prince Vajiralongkorn, will inherit the throne.

Thailand is making preparations for the prince to ascend the throne on December 1, Reuters reported in October.

Pornpetch Wichitcholchai, head of the National Legislative Assembly, said lawmakers had been asked not to take leave between November 28 and December 2 and not to travel abroad or outside of the capital Bangkok over an upcoming long weekend holiday.

“December 3 to December 5 are holidays and the government might have urgent legislation to raise or a special session might be called,” Pornpetch told Reuters.

Pornpetch said that the assembly had not yet been ordered by the government to enact Article 23 of the constitution, which says that parliament will convene and invite the heir to the throne to become king and “proclaim such heir king”.

Parliament needs a quorum in order to proclaim the new monarch.

Prayuth said last month that the prince had asked to delay his ascension to the throne while he mourns his father.

Regardless of when the prince ascends the throne, a formal coronation can only take place following the late king’s cremation next year.

A four-year-old boy died after he took medicine to treat high blood pressure which belonged to his grandmother, major Chinese dailies reported.

The family members of Li Xin Jie felt something amiss when the boy started to vomit at their house in Kampung Simpang Durian in Negri Sembilan on Friday, reported Sin Chew Daily.

They quickly checked with the boy and was told that he had taken the medicine.

His grandmother found several pills missing. Family members rushed him to the Kuala Pilah Hospital.

However, the boy, who is the eldest among three siblings, died the next day.

The inaugural Michelin Guide Shanghai 2017 debuted in China earlier and it certainly made an immediate impact, though not necessarily a positive one.

The 224-page guide is printed in Chinese and English and retails for 168 yuan (S$35). Before its official launch, more than 1,800 copies had already been sold on Tmall, China’s largest shopping platform. However, sales figures have stagnated since.

The culinary guide, widely regarded as the most authoritative of its kind by food experts around the world, quickly drew criticism for its less than extensive selection of dining establishments.

In contrast to the Michelin Guide Tokyo 2016, which dished out stars to more than 200 restaurants, only 26 restaurants in Shanghai were awarded stars. However, some experts say that Michelin is usually conservative with its first guide for a city.

Read also: Michelin eatery in Shanghai shut over license

While 19 of these establishments were Chinese restaurants, many critics lamented at how the guide had left out those that served outstanding Shanghai cuisine, or benbangcai, and instead had a skew toward Cantonese fare. Furthermore, only 25 restaurants were listed in the Bib Gourmand, defined in China as a selection of dining establishments that offer good food for under 200 yuan per person.

In response to the criticism faced by the guide, Claire Dorland Clauzel, vice president of Michelin International, told China Daily: “We don’t target Chinese or foreign diners. We choose quality cooking, which is true all over the world.”

Michelin mythology

T’ang Court, a Cantonese restaurant located in Langham Hotel in Shanghai’s Xintiandi area, was the only restaurant to be awarded three stars. The restaurant’s Hong Kong outlet received the same accolade last year.

“Overwhelmed and unexpected,” says Tan Shiye, chef of T’ang Court, after receiving the award.

The Guangdong native attributed the restaurant’s success to its dedication to preserving the original flavors of the ingredients it uses.

Over in Shanghai’s Xuhui district, Tai’an Table became the most short-lived Michelin-starred restaurant in history when it closed down just a day after receiving a star. Local authorities says that the restaurant had not been operating with the proper licenses.

In a written response to the public, Stefan Stiller, chef and owner of the restaurant, defended his dining establishment by claiming that the space was mainly used to “entertain friends and have some foodies and chef friends around to create new and creative dishes”.

His statement, however, seems to contradict what he says during an earlier interview with Chinese media when he shared how each of the dishes on his set menu is prepared by up to six cooks who work 14 to 16 hours every day.

In addition, customers at Tai’an Table fork out 998 yuan or 1,288 yuan for set menus of 10 and 14 dishes respectively. Most of the restaurant’s diners are Chinese.

Before the guide landed in Shanghai, the word “Michelin” was enough to entice scores of people to attend events graced by Michelin-starred chefs. In 2011, when luxury hotel Park Hyatt Shanghai first introduced its annual Masters of Food and Wine event by inviting a handful of celebrity chefs including Alain Ducasse, the tickets to the celebrity chef dinners were snapped up within days despite their price of almost 1,000 yuan.

This approach to leverage the magnetism of Michelin-starred chefs has since inspired many other restaurants and events in the country to do the same. Last year, Savour, a four-day food festival in Shanghai, attracted tens of thousands of visitors who were eager to try the dishes prepared by 15 Michelin-starred restaurants.

“Michelin has developed the mythology for more than 100 years, and it is trusted by people all over the world. Today, the Michelin guide is the unique guide in the world,” says Clauzel, about the guide’s reputation and advantages over other food critics and awards.

Not a difficult decision

While the company is famously tight-lipped about the identities of its food inspectors, Clauzel revealed that the majority of the inspectors for the Shanghai guide are Chinese. However, only one of them is a Shanghai native.

Finding the right inspectors has proved to be the biggest challenge for the Shanghai project, which took a little over a year and involved some 500 restaurants, added Clauzel.

Michelin had earlier announced that it would finally release a guide for a city in the Chinese mainland, about nine years after it published the first guide for Hong Kong and Macao.

“We have been in Hong Kong and Macao for almost decade, it was time to come to the Chinese mainland. Michelin is an international company and we look at every market as soon as the culinary scene is ready,” says Clauzel.

While Clauzel did not elaborate on how Michelin determines whether a market is ready for a guide, she says that the decision to choose Shanghai was not a difficult one seeing how it is “as exciting and dynamic a culinary destination as Singapore and Seoul” and is widely regarded as the gateway to China.

The Michelin Guide Singapore was unveiled in July this year and was also subjected to similar criticism. Many Singaporeans had complained that the island nation’s famous hawker fare was not well represented enough in the guide.

Read also: Welcome to Singapore, Michelin, but Singaporeans don’t like you

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2016-07-22 12:28:08

Photo Gallery

Tai Hwa Pork Noodle and Hong Kong Soya Sauce Chicken Rice & Noodle awarded one Michelin star

Source:

AFP

The Straits Times

The Business Times

The New Paper

Shin Min Daily News

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Shanghai’s Michelin-starred restaurants

Exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey

T’ang Court

Excellent cooking, worth a detour

8 1/2 Otto E Mezzo Bombana

L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon

Ultra Violet

Canton 8

Yi Long Court

Imperial Treasure

YongFoo Elite

High quality cooking, worth a stop

Sir Elly’s

Da Dong (iapm)

Da Dong (Park Place)

Madam Goose (Xinzhuang)

Phenix

Fu He Hui

Seventh Son (Kerry Center)

Jin Xuan

Kanpai Classic

Lao Zheng Xing

Lei Garden (IFC)

Lei Garden (iapm)

Shang-High

Le Patio & la Famille

Jade Mansion

Taian Table

Xin Rong Ji (Shanghai Plaza)

Yong Yi Ting

Source: The Michelin Guide Shanghai 2017

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2016-08-05 19:37:00

Photo Gallery

12 foodie favourites you might not have known are in Michelin Guide Singapore 2016

Source:

Various sources

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