Chinese Cooking Art

Chinese cooking embodies the dining culture tradition of Chinese nation. Compared with the cooking of all other nations in the world, it has many distinctive features. 

Firstly, it has varied flavor. Since our country has a vast territory and abundant resources with differences in climate, products, customs and habits in all parts, it has developed many flavors in diet over a long period of time. There has been the saying of rice in the south and noodles in the north in our country all the time. The flavor is divided into sweetness in the south, saltiness in the north, sourness in the east and hotness in the west, which can mainly be reduced to the four flavors of Bashu (Sichun), Qilu (Shandong), Huaiyang (Jiangsu) and Yuemin (Guangdong and Fujian).

Secondly, there are differences in four seasons. With four seasons in a year, people take food according the seasons, which is another feature of Chinese cooking. Since antiquity, our country has always seasoned and matched food with the variation of seasons. The flavor is pure and thick in winter while light and cool in summer. The food are mostly braised, stewed, simmered in winter and cold and dressed with sauce and frozen in summer

Thirdly, it places an emphasis on aesthetic feeling. Chinese cooking has not only superior techniques, but also has the tradtion of placing an emphasis on the aesthetic feeling of dishes and pays attention to the harmony and agreement of food’s color, fragrance, flavor, shape and utensils. The aesthetic feeling of dishes has all around representations. Whether it is a red radish or a green cabbage, all kind of designs can be carved out, which has a unique style, attains the harmony of color, fragrance, flavor, shape and beauty and provides people with highly unified special enjoyment in spirit and material.
Fourthly, it pays attention to temperament and interest. The cooking of our country has placed an emphasis on taste and interest since very early times. It not only has strict requirements on the color, fragrance and flavor of meals and snacks, but also has certain requirements on the naming of dishes, the manner of tasting the flavor, the rhythm of having dinner and the insertion of entertainment, etc. The names of Chinese dishes can be called reaching the aceme of perfection and suiting both refined and popular tastes. The dishes may named realistically according to the main ingredients, supplementary ingredients and seasoning as well as their cooking methods or called in accordance with historical literary quotations, myths, legends, the intereting episodes of celebrities taking food, the image of dishes, such as "family collections (made of all sorts of seafood and riverfood)", "red lion\'s head (fried meatballs in brown sauce)", "beggar\'s chicken" (roasted chicken in yellow mud).

Lastly, it combines food with medicine. The cooking technique of our country is closely related with medical treament and health care. There has been the statement that food and medicine have the same origin and action since several thousand years ago. It takes advantage of the medicinal properties of the raw materials of food and makes them into all kinds of cuisine, thereby accomplishing the purpose of preventing and curing certain diseases.