Chinese Food Information!

Chinese food is one of the most popular types of cuisine in the world. What is your favourite dish? Sweet and sour chicken, Hoisin Duck, Kung Pow Chicken or Dim Sung?


Here we detail the most popular and lesser known dishes from China. From recipes to restaurant recommendations, the history of their creation and their cultural significance. Each region of China have their own style of cuisine, some of which are well known in other parts of the world, some of which are not as yet.

The act of eating Chinese food is also different from that of other cultures i.e. eating with chopsticks,  and this is what many people around the world enjoy about the experience of eating Chinese food, coupled with the many alluring, unique aromas of the food, along with its distinctive, exotic tastes.

The unique ambience of a Chinese restaurant also plays a massive part in many people's experience with Chinese food. Classical Chinese music and traditional decor all contribute. Lighting is important, bringing out the vibrancy of the food, with its vivid palette of colours.

Chinese food is popular for a reason, here we detail why!

Chinese Main Courses

Part 2 of Main Courses:

Ginger Beef

Slivers of beef are marinated in ginger juice, battered and fried.  Sometimes it is deep fried twice to make it more crispy. The authentic chinese version of the meal is drier and not as sweet as the one served in many restaurants in the west.

Kung Pao Chicken 

This famous dish is made from dicing chicken breast and deep frying it, with roasted peanuts.  A ginger and chilli sauce accompanies it. 

Lemon Chicken 

This dish is made from diced, deep-fried battered chicken, in a lemon sauce.

Lo Mein. This dish is made from tossed noodles in sauce.  Unlike Chow Mein , these noodles are tossed and cooked together with the stir fry mix.

Crispy Skin Duck (Xang Su Ya)

Steamed duck with a deep-fried skin.

Dou Ban Yu

This is fish in a spicy sauce with ginger and garlic.  Trout, carp, and sea bass can be used.

Dry Garlic Spareribs

These are pork ribs that are simmered twice.  The second simmering takes place in a sauce of garlic, mustard and brown sugar.

Fried Rice

There are many variants of fried rice, served with the different meats available on the menu.  The rice, now cold (having been previously cooked) is fried with scrambled eggs and vegetables.

General Tsao's Chicken 

According to wikipedia, this dish is "named after General Tso Tsung-tang, or Zuo Zongtang, a Qing dynasty general and statesman, although there is no recorded connection to him. The real roots of the dish lie in the post-1949 exodus of chefs to the United States."

Chicken breast is diced and covered in cornstarch before it is deep fried in a sauce combining hoisin, soy and chilli pepper.

Chinese Food Menu - Chicken and Beef Dishes

Today in our series on the Chinese Food Menu, we take you to the main dishes usually on offer in Chinese restaurants!  We will do this in two parts as there are many dishes available and we want to keep this easily digestable for our readers!

Beggar's Chicken

Inline image 1Stuffed chicken is wrapped in dough and baked.
Cheng Du Chicken (Chili Chicken Cubes)

Diced chicken breasts are marinated and deep-fried; the sauce is made from hot bean sauce, freshly ground Szechuan pepper, vinegar and sugar. 



Chow Mein (Fried noodles)


In this dish the noodles and vegetables are stir-fried separately, then mixed together at the end of the cooking procedure.  The noodles can be soft or crispy depending on how long they are fried in oil.  It can be made with either thick or thin noodles.  A gravy is either added to the noodles while they are being stir-fried or at the final stage of cooking. Chicken, shrimp or pork are used as the meat.  

Ants Climbing Trees (Ants Creeping on Trees, Ants Climbing a Hill, Ma Yi Shang Shu)

This is a spicy Szechuan dish: marinated pork is cooked in a spicy sauce and served on cellophane (bean thread) noodles.
Bang Bang Ji (Hot Chicken Salad) 


Chicken breasts with hot chili oil are cut into small pieces and served on a sheet of green bean paste. 

Beef in Oyster Sauce




Beef is thinly sliced and then marinated with several ingredients that usually include sherry, soy sauce, cornstarch and sometimes sugar. The beef is stir-fried or deep-fried and then oyster sauce is added. 

Beef with Broccoli

Marinated beef is stir-fried and mixed with stir-fried vegetables - then covered with a thick brown sauce that may also include oyster sauce.

Chinese Food Menu

Chinese Food Menu

Yesterday we told you about the starters on many menus in Chinese restaurants, in order to help the unitiated among you.  Today we are moving to the next section of a menu before people attempt to decide on their main course: Soup!

Hot and Sour Soup

There are many regional variations of this soup are found throughout China.  All of theses contain bean curd, Chinese black mushrooms and usually pork, but the remaining ingredients can vary. 

Wonton Soup

The word Wonton translates as "swallowing a cloud" and in this soup the floating Wontons do resemble tiny clouds.  They are filled with a mixture of meat (usually pork) and seasoning and are boiled, and then added to the stock. 

Egg Drop Soup

 

A Chinese classic: flavoured chicken broth or stock topped with threads of egg. It usually comes with a green onion garnish, and sometimes green peas are added to the stock.

Chinese Food Menu

Understanding the menu in a chinese restaurant / takeaway

Many people become confused in Chinese restaurants if they are not experienced with the cuisine on offer. They are slightly intimidated by the exotic names and mix of ingredients making up the dishes. So to help the inexperienced, we have decided to explain what is often on the menu!  Today we will start (excuse the pun) with Starters!

  

Deep Fried Wontons

  

Wonton wrappers are filled with ground pork and a variety of vegetables and seasonings before they are deep-fried.  

Crab Rangoon


This starter has become very popular in some parts of the USA, although it is not an authentic Chinese dish.  The wontons are stuffed with crab, cream cheese and scallions and deep-fried.      

 

These are very popular in the west even though they are not eaten in China. Egg rolls are a larger version of Spring rolls.  They are normally filled with barbecued pork or shrimp - vegetables can include cabbage, celery, suey choy, and/or bean sprouts.

Spring Roll

A lighter, more delicate version of egg rolls, made with a flour and water wrapping (no egg), deep-fried

The History of Chinese Food

The History of Chinese Food:

The history of Chinese cuisine is marked by both variety and change. The archaeologist and scholar K.C. Chang says “Chinese people are especially preoccupied with food” and “food is at the center of, or at least it accompanies or symbolizes, many social interactions.” Over the course of history, he says, "continuity vastly outweighs change." He explains basic organizing principles which go back to earliest times and give a continuity to the food tradition, principally that a normal meal is made up of fan（饭/飯） (grains and other starches) and cai（菜） (vegetable or meat dishes).

Chinese cuisine as we now know it evolved gradually over the centuries as new food sources and techniques were introduced, discovered, or invented. Although many of the characteristics we think of as the most important appeared very early, others did not appear or did not become important until relatively late. The first chopsticks, for instance, were probably used for cooking, stirring the fire, and serving bits of food and were not initially used as eating utensils. They began to take on this role during the Han dynasty, but it was not until the Ming that they became ubiquitous for both serving and eating. It was not until the Ming that they acquired their present name (筷子, kuaizi) and their present shape. The wok may also have been introduced during the Han, but again its initial use was limited (to drying grains) and its present use (to stir-fry, as well as boiling, steaming, roasting, and deep-frying) did not develop until the Ming.

The Ming also saw the adoption of new plants from the New World, such as corn, peanuts, and tobacco. Wilkinson remarks that to "somebody brought up on late twentieth century Chinese cuisine, Ming food would probably still seem familiar, but anything further back, especially pre-Tang would probably be difficult to recognize as 'Chinese'.

The "Silk Road" is the conventional term for the routes through Central Asia linking the Iranian plateau with western China; along this trade route passed exotic foodstuffs that greatly enlarged the potential for Chinese cuisines, only some of which preserve their foreign origin in the radical for "foreign" that remains in their name.

To be continued....