The History of Cooking in China

China represents one of the richest and most diverse cuisines in the world. In Chinese culture a meal usually consists of a carbohydrate or starch, rice noodles...etc, accompanied by vegetables, meat, fish or other dishes. Rice is a critical part of China's cuisine. However, many parts of china, particularly the northern region, wheat based food such as noodles and steamed buns are more popular than rice, unlike the southern region where rice is more popular. Sometimes, as major as rice is, it is not served at all. For example, rice is usually not served at extremely formal events, and it would only be served when and if there were no other dishes to serve or at the end of the meal it would be served as a token dish to compliment the meal. In the southern region soup is usually served at the beginning and at the end of the meal.

The primary utensil for eating is wooden chopsticks for solid foods and a wide flat bottomed spoon for soups. Because of logging shortfalls in China and eastern Asia, wooden chopsticks are not as popular as they once were. Establishments are now starting to use environmentally sustainable bamboo or plastic chopsticks. Ivory and silver are some of the more expensive materials used for chopsticks for personal use or large restaurant establishments, while wooden and bamboo chopsticks are more convenient for small restaurant establishments since they are disposable.

Meals are prepared in small bite sized pieces that are ready to be picked up, by the chopsticks, and eaten. Forks and knives are not used for eating in the Chinese culture because they consider it barbaric because they are regarded as weapons. Also, being the gracious hosts Chinese are known as, they consider it ungracious for their guests to have to work at cutting their own food.

Fish are usually cooked and served whole, unlike in other countries where the fish is filleted first. In China fish are served in this manner because it is ideal for fish to be served as fresh as possible. Being a tender meat, fish is easily picked off in pieces with chopsticks.

In a Chinese meal every diner is given their own individual bowl of rice while the rest of the meal is served on a communal platter, family style, that is shared by everyone at the table. The bite sized food is taken off the platter by each diner with the use of chopsticks. Non Chinese may be discouraged to join in on the meal for fear of saliva residue from other diners chopsticks getting on the food in the communal platter, in such a case extra chopsticks or spoons can be made available.