Eight Regional Variations
• Chinese cuisine has a number of different genres, but the most influential and typical known by the public are the 'Eight Cuisines'.
• These are as follows: Shandong Cuisine, Sichuan Cuisine, Guangdong Cuisine, Fujian Cuisine , Jiangsu Cuisine, Zhejiang Cuisine, Hunan Cuisine, and Anhui Cuisine.
• The essential factors that establish the form of a genre are complex and include history, cooking features, geography, climate, resources and life styles.
Sichuan Cuisine
• This combines the cuisines from Chengdu and Chongqing.
• It features pungent seasonings which were famed as 'Three Peppers' (Chinese prickly ash, pepper and hot pepper), 'three aroma' (shallot, ginger, and garlic), 'Seven Tastes' (sweet, sour, tingling, spicy, bitter, piquant, and salty), and 'eight flavors' (fish-flavored, sour with spice, pepper-tingling, odd flavor, tingling with spice, red spicy oily, ginger sauce, and home cooking).
• 三香三椒,七滋八味
• 三香乃葱、姜、蒜,
• 三椒乃辣椒、胡椒、花椒,
• 三料乃醋、郫县豆瓣酱、醪糟。
• 炒菜需有葱姜蒜,这是放之四海而皆准的真理,四川人尤其把这三椒的花样弄得别出心裁,产生了七滋八味。
• 七滋是指:酸、甜、苦、辣、麻、香、咸。
• 八味是指:鱼香、麻辣、酸辣、干烧、辣子、红油、怪味、椒麻。
• 九杂是指用料之杂。
• Delicious dishes menu:
– Stir-fried Tofu with Minced Beef in Spicy Bean Sauce - A real feast of tender bean curd, minced beef, pepper and bean sauce.
– Lung Pieces by Couple - a quite popular in Chengdu. It got the name because the dish was ever sold be a couple and today it remains the original savor, tender meat, tingling and spicy.
– Gong Bao Ji Ding - in Chinese it is called Gong Bao Ji Ding. This is a tender chicken dish, tender as the meat is quickly fried. Flavored with peanuts, this is tasty and very popular
Shandong Cuisine
• This is the local flavor of Jinan City and Jiaodong peninsula derived from the use of shallots and garlic. Both restaurant Chefs and those in families are expert in cooking seafood, soups, meat and offal. The typical menu can include many delicate dishes such as:
– Braised sea whelks in brown sauce 红烧海螺
– Braised sea slug with crab meat in brown sauce 蟹烧海参
– Quick- boiled clam 油爆大蛤
– Dezhou grilled chicken 德州扒鸡
Guangdong Cuisine
• Guangdong Cuisine takes fine and rare ingredients and is cooked with polished skills and in a dainty style. It emphasizes a flavor which is clear but not light, refreshing but not common, tender but not crude. In summer and autumn it pursues clarity and in winter and spring, a little more substance. Typical menu here can ultimately embody these characteristics:
Jiangsu Cuisine
• Jiangsu Cuisine developed from the local recipes of Yangzhou, Suzhou and Nanjing. Its main cooking techniques are braising and stewing, thereby enhancing the original flavor and sauce.
• The elegant color, novel sculpts, with salt and sweet taste will soothe your stomach.
– Braised meat with vegetables and wine 百菜酒焖肉
– Stuffed pork breast with pine kernels 松子肉
– Lion‘s head braised with crab-powder 蟹粉狮子头
Zhejiang Cuisine
• As Zhejiang cuisine consists of hundreds of small delicacies from its main cities, it takes in Hangzhou's fineness and diversification, Ningbo's softness and originality, and Shaoxing's pastoral interests.
• The chief techniques of cooking lie in the methods used such as frying, quick-fry, stir-fry, braising, and steaming.
– West-lake braised fish in vinegar 西湖醋鱼
– Shelled shrimps cooked in Longjing tea 龙井虾仁
Hunan Cuisine
• Hunan cuisine lays a stress on the use of oil, dense color, and techniques that produce crispness, softness and tenderness as well as the savory flavors and spices.
– Braised dried pork with eel slices 腊肉焖鳝片
– Sweet lotus seed 冰糖莲藕
– Steamed fried pork in black bean sauce 走油豆豉扣肉
Fujian Cuisine
• Fujian cuisine has four distinctive features, that is, fine cutting techniques, alternative soups, unique seasonings, and exquisite cooking.
– Crisp pomfret with litchi 荔枝鲳鱼
– Fricassee shark’s fin with chicken 白烧大翅
– Fried prawn shaped as a pair of fish 太极明虾
– Steamed chicken ball with egg-white 蒸芙蓉鸡球
Anhui Cuisine
• It is mainly composed of local flavors of Huizhou and other areas along the Yangtze River and the Huai River. Among the dishes on the Ahhui cuisine menu, you will find less fried or quick-fried dishes than those that are braised. People here are inclined to add ham as seasoning and sugar candy to enrich the freshness and are quite accomplished in the art of cooking.
– Gourd duck 葫芦鸭子
– Fuliji stewed chicken 符离集烧鸡