I think we're on the same wavelength. Whenever business takes me to the boondocks, I try to:

1) sample almost every dish and only play the "allergy card" when absolutely necessary
2) ingest crazy amounts of rice
and
3) book myself at hotel that serves decent burgers in case I have to spend the night

If I manage to get of there during the same day, I grab some grub at the airport (McD's and KFC are the usual suspects, but I can also handle airport ramen).

Many readers of this forum are amazed that, in light of all of my ground time in China, I have such an anal attitude towards its cuisine.

While I have no polite response to this in mind, if any of you were to take my place at a lunch banquet in the outskirts of Ningbo, you'd gain a much greater appreciation for the Big Mac. Furthermore, upon your return to a big city (where decent Chinese food is widely available), you'd still find yourself at an Outback or a Tony Roma's.

And, if you were to do those lunch banquets 3x per week for 10 years, you'd also come around to the idea that PF Chang's is pretty good.