Snacks in Suzhou

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Suzhou was amazing. Superman Tom booked us a few days there for my birthday. We stayed in the older more tourist-oriented area on pingjianglu with cobbled streets full of tea shops and canals (we even got serenaded whilst punting!). The main central shopping streets are just as modern as Hangzhou, with all the usual fast food places and restaurants, but it’s just not quite as built up, which was really noticeable when we went up Bei si pagoda for a panoramic view. (The city literally explodes into skyscrapers around the outer edge, but I’m assuming there must be planning issues stopping development in the centre.)
Anyway, we spent all our time sightseeing and wandering around all the famous gardens so we didn’t have many big sit-down meals, but we did get to know some great on-the-go snacks and good places to stop for drinks, so I thought I’d add them in here.
See pics/captions.

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Photos

Boiled Eggs
We found these eggs boiled in black tea in the gift shop at the Suzhou opera museum! The tea gives them a delicate perfumed flavour - by far the nicest boiled eggs I've tasted and only 1rmb/10p each. I've seen them in Hanzhou too, you can find them all over, but mostly they are sat by the tills in the 7/11 shops.

Tea egg
This one isn't that dark, normally they are more marbled by the tea.

Corn on the cob
Corn on the cob... on a stick. Self explanatory!

Roasted Chestnuts
There's stalls everywhere selling these, unfortunately we were usually in a rush when passing so didn't get time to stop and buy

Xinjiang yakexi, 768 shiquan jie
This is a hole in the wall attached to the restaurant which sells kebabs and naan bread for 3rmb each (30p).

Kebabs cooking
Tasty but half meat and half fat.

Gus' cafe
This was a little gem which sold great gin and cocktails. 26 wuzhou lu

Mingtown Cafe
This was a cafe that was linked to our hostel on pingjiang lu. We got money-off vouchers so got breakfast here one day - it sells loads of western style dishes.

Breakfast
Breakfast at mingtown cafe - scrambled eggs on toast around 35rmb/£3.50

Toms breaky
Cooked breakfast, sausages bacon, eggs and toast for around 35rmb/£3.5

Wraps on Taijian lane
6rmb - 11rmb (60p-£1) depending on the filling. I got meat and egg (I thought it was going to be chicken, but it turns out it was saying "chicken egg" - so think the meat was pork.) Anyway, they wrap it up in a pancake with cucumber and hoisin sauce. We came back here twice!

Da Tang Bing Yi
selling sweets/pastries on Taijian lane (renmin lu end)

Da Tang Bing Yi
selling sweets/pastries (renmin lu end)

Da Tang Bing Yi
This was pastry with chocolate flavoured paste in, (similar texture to red bean paste) with a hard boiled egg yolk in the middle. Sounds wrong, tastes surprisingly good.

Viennetta!
Yes my friends, this is viennetta on a stick.

Fruit
Never far from a fruit stall. We got a bag of satsumas from this guy for 5rmb/50p

Tea House
This was a tea house on pingjiang lu. It overlooked the canal and sold loads of cocktails and different teas.