Let loose on Tianjin's 'Kitchen Street'

The smell of metal under duress pours out of the kitchen. I race in, scoop the frying pan off the heat and dash it into the sink - only to be told: "You ruined my eggs!"

The fact is they were already burnt beyond recognition, a victim of cheap technology.

If you want to cook, flimsy fry pans are no use to you.

You need something that's got some heft to it, a pan solid enough to leave dents if brought down swiftly on cooktops.

With my wife Ellen scorching the non-stick lining off a thin aluminum pan, it is time to look for something that better suits my needs.

After a look through the local supermarkets, all I can find is the run-of-the-mill cheap, lightweight pans, the sort that won't last a few months before the non-stick coating wears off.

The bigger department stores have some lovely cookware, but it only comes as sets or single pieces at prices which will force me to take out a second mortgage on our apartment.

There is no dearth of woks, but anyone who has tried to make crepes in a wok will tell you that you just need a very flat-bottomed pan.

So I put the word out to friends and students, to see if they can recommend somewhere that I can indulge my passion for pans at a pittance.

It takes a while, but eventually, one place keeps turning up in conversations, "Kitchen Street".

Unfortunately, no one has a clue as to where it is.

Maps are consulted, phone calls made, and innocent passers-by questioned as to where it might be.

Eventually, someone who must have shaken down a restaurateur for the details, hands me a piece of paper with the address on it.

Bundling Ellen into a taxi, we are off ...

Off to a rather deserted looking part of Tianjin, which certainly does not look like it would be home to what has been described as "somewhere you can set up a whole kitchen from". There is just nothing there.

Heartbroken, I turn to cross the road and catch a taxi back to work.

Just then a coppery gleam catches my eye. There, through a window long dimmed by dust, is the outline of a frying pan.

"Kitchen Street" is, after all, real, and we have found it.

To call Tianjin's "Kitchen Street" a street is a bit of a misnomer. It is a long covered walkway within a building, along which are arranged shops that cover all areas of the food-preparation and service industry.

It has everything - from a concrete-mixer sized dough machine to make enough bread to feed a small army, to crockery and glassware to furnish an entire restaurant.

Another shop sells waitress' outfits and chefs' jackets, and a strange sort of "Chocolate Box Soldier" uniform that I am told is popular with parking attendants.

Others sell industrial gas ranges and ovens, refrigerators and extractors - it is like being in a stainless steel food preparation heaven.

Toward the middle of the alley, I find the store I have been looking for - piled high with gleaming implements of the kitchen trade. After a little negotiation, I am the proud owner of a new, very heavy pan.

Then I am dragged away by Ellen, before I can spend any more money on chefs' toys!