Chinese cooking regional, exportable and closely tied to culture

By Nina C. Zimmermann Dec 22, 2011, 3:06 GMT

Berlin - Chinese cooking has tremendous local significance. The ingredients, seasonings and customs used in preparing the food are determined by region, and even though top chefs put their own personal touch on their dishes, there is no reason average cooks shouldn't try their hand at cooking a Chinese meal.

Li Hong, a Beijing-born woman who has lived in Berlin for several years, remembers eating three times a day as a child, each meal warm and with multiple courses.

'On the weekend my parents spent the entire day in the kitchen preparing food for the week,' Li said. 'To us food meant Chinese quality of life.'

That is a sentiment with which Tim Raue, a German chef who operates a restaurant bearing his name in Berlin, would agree. He considers China his 'culinary home' and admires the way food there is treated with 'incredible purism.'

This doesn't include the kind of wok cooking known outside China. He refers instead to the 95 per cent of the dishes - red cooked pork and crispy duck in lemon sauce, for example - that can be described as pure. Vegetables are always served alongside these dishes, never cooked together with them.

'The country is unbelievably large and diverse,' he said. 'This is demonstrated in the many different regional cuisines.'

Chinese food as presented in the average Chinese restaurant outside the country doesn't exist there. Food differs from province to province by degree of spiciness and other seasoning and whether shellfish or meat is used.

'The spiciest dishes are made in Hunan. It is a completely different hot to that of the food in Sichuan, which is due in part to Sichuan pepper,' Raue said.

In Shanghai the food is sweet-and-sour and in Beijing more salt-and-sour. Numerous visits to Hong Kong have inspired him to cook Cantonese cuisine more than any other style. Its harmony makes it most comparable to French cooking.

Li Hong's mother came from Sichuan where people love to eat spicy food, while her father came from the southern region of Anhui where tofu is common. She grew up in Beijing.

The various culinary influences of these regions are combined in a new cookbook she has produced of her favourite family recipes.

It includes recipes from her mother - eggplant stewed in oil, ginger, garlic, spicy bean paste and leeks - and from her father - tofu with chicken in a dark sauce. Another example is pan-fried zucchini, a popular dish in northern China.

'Even cooks who don't know Chinese cooking are able to cook a good Chinese meal,' said Hong. She uses ingredients that she gets in well-stocked Asian markets.

Raue is also a fan of such shops and ingredients that are more pleasing to the European palate than some exclusive Chinese specialties.

Gradually, he has abandoned efforts to serve sea cucumber or the much-loved bird's nest soup made from the nest of the swiftlet, a swallow-like bird that builds its nests in caves using its own saliva.

'Bird's nests cost as much as white truffles,' Raue said. 'It makes more sense to serve white truffles here than bird's nests.'

Another concession he makes to please local guests is a dish he calls Peking duck interpretation TR. Guests at his restaurant can order the dish just for themselves but in China the dish is meant to be served in the middle of the table so that everyone can try it.

Raue does not cook exclusively Chinese, or more precisely Cantonese, food. He says the aromatics are too one-dimensional, therefore he prefers to look beyond China's borders to other Asian countries - Thailand and Japan, for example - for seasoning that is popular there.

Kai Mehler, who runs a cookery and pastry school in the western German town of Gersheim, also tries to take ideas from Chinese cooking and modify them to the French or Swiss palate.

An example is a dessert he created using wan tan noodle dough found in an Asian market filled with custard and fruit. Another is a sorbet or mousse made from Asian fruits such as lychees, mangos and dragon fruit.

To him the basic difference between Chinese and German cooking lies in the amount of cutting necessary in preparing the food. 'Generally, Asian cuisine requires a lot of preparation,' he said. 'Then you can get started and be done cooking in 10 minutes.'