If you think Chinese noodles are just thin, long strips of dough, think again. In Taiyuan alone, you'll find a remarkable variety of sizes and shapes. There are short and tapered ones that look like little chilis, flat and wide ribbons, slivers with ragged edges, thin square pieces, as well as ones shaped like cat ears.

Taiyuan, the capital of the northern province of Shanxi, dubbed "the home of wheaten food" in China, considers noodle making an art. Some local chefs can produce up to 260,000 noodle threads from 1.5 kilograms of dough, while others have filled a bowl with a noodle strand hundreds of meters long.

In one of the city's traditional Shanxi restaurants, Jinyunlou on 188 West Tiyu Road, diners are treated to noodle-making performances. Guests might see one of the cooks doing the hula hoop while scissor-cutting a piece of dough, or riding a unicycle while shaving pieces off the dough sitting on his head.