Chinese Cuisines Chinese cuisine is a brilliant facet of Chinese culture, which is proven by the fact that Chinese restaurants are found scattered everywhere around the world. Today, the culinary industry is developing even more rapidly than before. A decade ago, Beijing had a few thousand restaurants, while today there are over 100,000 restaurants of different sizes in the city.

民以食为天 People regard food as their heaven. For the common folks food is heaven. Food the first necessity of man. People regard food as their prime want. 开门七件事，柴米油盐酱醋茶。 7 daily necessities, woods (coals), rice, oil, salt, sauce, vineger and tea.

Local Chinese Cuisines It is widely acknowledged that from the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1616-1911) dynasties onwards, there arose eight schools of cuisine, respectively from Shandong, Sichuan, Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Hunan, and Anhui provinces. In addition to these traditional cuisines, the culinary industry in China has undergone great changes, as almost every place has its own local specialties, just as different cuisines have gathered in one place.

In big cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, one can tastes all the familiar and famed dishes from around the country.

Shandong Cuisine Consisting of Jinan Cuisine and Jiaodong cuisine, Shandong cuisine, clear, pure and not greasy, is characterized by its emphasis on aroma, freshness, crispness, and tenderness. Shallot and garlic are usually used as seasonings so Shandong dishes taste pungent usually. Jinan cuisine is adept at deep-frying, grilling, frying and stir-frying while Jiadong division is famous for cooking seafood with fresh and light taste.

Shallot

Dezhou Style Braised chicken

It is made by a whole chicken cooked with crude herb It is made by a whole chicken cooked with crude herb. When served it is a chicken in the plate, gold and red in color. If you shake it with its leg, all bones and flesh will separate automatically. Braised chicken has a brilliant taste, tender salty and a little sweet, very different from Beijing Roast Duck.

Sauted Sea Cucumber with Shallot

Shandong Province is half-plane circled by sea, so sea food is a major component of Shandong cuisine. Sea cucumber is high in nutritional value. It is cooked with shallow because it can remove the fishy smell of sea cucumbers. It tastes fresh and light and sea cucumber tastes a little fishy.

Sichuan Cuisine Sichuan, known as Nature’s Storehouse, is also a storehouse of cuisine. Here, each and every restaurant provides delicious yet economic culinary fare. The ingredients for Sichuan cuisine are simple but the spices used are quite different. Sichuan cuisine is famous for its spicy and hot food, yet just being hot and spicy does not

necessarily distinguish it from other hot and spicy cuisines, such as Hunan and Guizhou Cuisine. What is really special about Sichuan cuisine is the use of Chinese prickly ash seeds, the taste of which leaves a feeling of numbness on one’s tongue and mouth.

Chinese prickly ash

Besides this unique spice, Sichuan dishes are also usually prepared with other spices like chili pepper. Using fermented bean sauce and a set of unique cooking methods.

The Gongbao (Kung Pao) chicken 宫保鸡丁

Ma-po tofu 麻婆豆腐

Tan Family Fish Head 谭家鱼头

Guangdong Cuisine Guangdong Province is located in Southern China, with a moderate climate and abundant produce all year round. As one of the earliest ports open to foreign trade, the province has developed a culinary culture with its own characteristics that has exerted a far-reaching influence on other parts of China.

Guangdong cuisine is famous for its seafood as well as for its originality and refined cooking processes. Various soups in this cuisine have become loved by people all over the country.

Areca Catechu spare rib 槟榔排骨

Crispy chichen 东江盐鸡

Abalone 鲍鱼

Barbecue Pork

Fujian Cuisine The most characteristic aspect of Fujian cuisine is that its dishes are served in soup. Its cooking methods are stewing, boiling, braising, quick-boiling, and steaming, The most famous dish is Buddha Jumps Over the Wall.

Jiangsu Cuisine Jiangsu cuisine, also known as Su Cai for short, is one of the major components of Chinese cuisine, and consists of the styles of Yangzhou, Nanjing, Suzhou and Zhenjiang dishes. It is very famous in the whole world for its distinctive style and taste. It is especially popular in the lower reach of the Yangtze River.

Jiangsu cuisine has the characteristics of strictly selected ingredients, exquisite workmanship, elegant shape, and rich culture trait. The typical raw materials are fresh and live aquatic products. It highlights the freshness of ingredients. Other cooking ingredients are often carefully selected tea leaves, bamboo shoots, mushrooms, pears, and dates.

Due to using the methods of stewing, braising, quick-frying, warming-up, stir-frying, wine sauce pickling and adding some sugar as condiments, Jiangsu dishes taste fresh, light and mellow.

Typical courses of Jiangsu cuisine are Jinling salted dried duck (Nanjing's most famous dish), crystal meat, clear crab shell meatballs, Yangzhou steamed Jerky strips (dried tofu, chicken, ham and pea leaves).

Jinling salted dried duck

Crystal meat

Minced pork and crab meat balls with bamboo shoots in a clear soup.

Yangzhou steamed Jerky strips

Zhejiang Cuisine Zhejiang Cuisine is light and exquisite, as representative of food from along the lower Yangtze River. One famous dish is West Lake Vinegar Fish, which looks delicate and tastes tender, with the refreshing flavors of nature. Many Chinese restaurants in China, as well as in other parts of the world, serve this dish, but usually with less authentic flavor compared to that found in Hangzhou.

West Lake Vinegar Fish 西湖醋鱼

Fried Shrimp 炒虾仁

Pork with pickled vegetable 梅菜扣肉

Hunan Cuisine Hunan Cuisine consists of local cuisines of Xiangjiang Region, Dongting Lake and Xiangxi Mountain Region. It is characterized by thick and pungent flavor. Chili, pepper and shallot are ususally necessaries in this division.

Dong’an Chick

Peppery and Hot Chick

Braised pork with brown sauce

Anhui Cuisine Anhui Cuisine chefs focus much more attention on the temperature in cooking and are good at braising and stewing. Often hams will be added to improve taste and sugar candy added to gain freshness.

Braised Turtle with Ham

Fuliji Grilled Chicken

Every Dish Has A Story The names of Chinese dishes are diverse, but behind each of the famous dishes is an interesting story explaining why it is popular. A catchy name may add value to the dish. However, some names are so eccentric that they may confuse people, both Chinese and foreigners. If you explain the names in a literal way, you may make a fool of yourself.

Take 狗不理 Goubuli ( Dog pays no attention) buns in the city of Tianjin for example. These popular buns are all handmade and of the same size. When served in near neat rows in the tray, they look like budding chrysanthemum flowers. The wrapping is thin, the fillings are juicy, and the taste is tender and delicious yet not at all greasy. Then why the name.

Goubuli 狗不理包子

Goubuli steamed buns were first sold in Tianjin about 150 years ago Goubuli steamed buns were first sold in Tianjin about 150 years ago. A local young man by the name Gouzi (Dog) worked as an apprentice in a shop selling Baozi (steamed buns). Three years later, he set up his own Baozi shop. Because his buns were so delicious, he soon had a thriving business, with more and more people coming for the buns. As hardworking as Dog was, he still could not meet the demands of his customers, who had to wait a long time. Impatiently, some people would call out to urge him on, but as he was

busy preparing the buns, he had no time to answer busy preparing the buns, he had no time to answer. People therefore called his buns Goubuli, meaning “Dog pays no attention.” This eccentric name, however, had very good promotional effects, and has been used ever since. Now Goubuli is a time-cherished brand name in Tianjin.

Dongpo Meat 东坡肉

In Zhejiang cuisine, there is a well-accepted dish called Dongpo Meat In Zhejiang cuisine, there is a well-accepted dish called Dongpo Meat. This dish is prepared over a slow fire, with streaky pork in big chunks and garnishes of green onion, ginger at the bottom of the pot, cooking wine, soy sauce, and sugar. The fished dish is bright red in color and tender and juice in taste, yet without any feel of greasiness. This dish was named after Su Dongpo (1037-1101) a great poet of Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127), who created it when he was an official in Hangzhou.

It is said that, when he was in charge of the drainage work for the West Lake, Su Dongpo rewarded workers with stewed pork in soy sauce, and people later named it Dongpo Meat, to commemorate this gifted and generous poet.

Buddha Jumping the Wall 佛跳墙

Fujian cuisine boasts a famous dish called Buddha Jumping the Wall, the No. 1 dish of the province. This dish is prepared with more than 20 main ingredients, including chicken, duck, sea cucumber, dried scallop, tendon, shark lip, fish maw, ham, and more than a dozen garnishes like mushrooms, winter bamboo shoots and pigeon eggs.

All these ingredients are placed into ceramic pot, with cooking wine and chicken both added, and then cooked over a slow fire until the meat is tender and juicy and the soup become smooth and thick. A taste of the dish will leave a lingering aftertaste in the mouth. The story behind the name of the specialty goes thus:

This dish was created by a restaurant called Gathering Spring Garden (聚春圆) in Fuzhou, Fujian, during the reign of Qing Emperor Guangxu (r. 1875-108). The dish was first named Eight Treasures Stewed in a Pot and later changed to Blessing and Longevity (福寿全) . One day, several scholars came to Gathering Spring Garden for a drink. When the dish was served, one of them improvised a poem:

“Fragrance spread to the neighborhood once the lid lifts/ One whiff and the Buddha jumps the wall, abandoning the Zen precepts,” “坛启荤香飘四邻，佛闻弃禅跳墙来”, hence the name of the dish.