Product Description

Each recipe is photographed as it is made, and is accompanied by pictures of techniques, equipment and ingredients, while stunning photographs shot on location in each country evoke their distinctive colour, cultures and histories. Explore one of the world's great cuisines from the Peking duck restaurants of Beijing, to the kitchens of Shanghai, through the tea gardens of Hangzhou to the dim sum chefs of Hong Kong.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #135528 in Books
• Published on: 2005-06-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 296 pages

Customer Reviews

A good overview of Chinese cookery, beautifully illustrated.
This is an absolutely beautiful book, which is a pleasure just to pour over. It gives a very good overview of the essentials of Chinese cookery, as well as containing mini-essays on such things as tea, banquets, dimsum, etc. It's recipes cover a wide range of Chinese regions and, for the most part, are clearly set out. My own quibbles with it (as a person who's been cooking Chinese from childhood) are that most of the recipes presuppose a knowledge of how to slice the ingredients and some have rather odd proportions. Also, there is a heavy bias towards a Cantonese cooking style, even in the dishes from other Chinese regions (speaking as a northerner myself). However, apart from these parts, the book provides a sumptious look at eating in China and is worth buying for the illustrations alone!

Authentic and practical Chinese home cooking
If any more practical, information-filled and enjoyable anthology of authentic Chinese home cooking exists than "The Food Of China", I have yet to discover it. Our little family group has bought three copies of this wonderful book so that it will be within easy reach at all times. My own copy soon will become the most soy sauce and sesame oil-spotted volume in my cookbook collection. If you want to know how to tuck the tastiest and neatest jiaozi, how to make home-cooking favourites like Grandma's Bean Curd, congee, tea eggs, turnip cake, or even sheng cai bao (stuffed lettuce leaves or san choy bao) and hot-sour soup, this is THE book.

Thank you authors Deh-Ta Hsiung and Nina Simonds for sharing your investigations, knowledge and obvious joy in Chinese cuisine.

Authenticity made simple
Like most, I buy a lot of cook books but do not end up actually cooking from them. How different with this one. One trip to a Chinese supermarket to stock up on the essentials and you are off. The recipes are clear and simple but produce fantastic results. If you only try one - it has to be the Hot and Sour soup. It tastes just like the best restaurant versions I've had.

In summary - I thought I'd never write a review - but the quality of this book deserves it. Food of Italy and Food of France are equally as good, although China wins by a short head.
Steve