Hello and 欢迎!
Welcome back everybody and hello to my first Deep Dive! Deep Dives are posts not dedicated to an entire nation but to either a group of people or a geographic location within the country. This could technically be done for any country – save maybe places like Liechtenstein – but that would make my project all but impossible.
Instead, since this is also my personal project, I chose countries that I either have a personal connection to, countries that are of specific interest to me, (I know, a bit unfair as this is 100% subjective) or, as this case exemplifies perfectly, countries that are so massive, that throwing their cuisines into one post doesn’t do them justice at all.
Also I love Chinese food and am currently trying to learn Mandarin Chinese (It’s so hard but also very interesting) so this is all the more reason to look more deeply into Chinese cuisine.
This post will focus on northern Chinese cuisine, among which the most famous is likely Shandong cuisine – traceable back over 2,500 years to the Chinese Autumn Period. Something I found to be incredibly fascinating.
Figuring it out
When speaking about Chinese food, there are very different approaches people (I am speaking for Austrians right now) often initially have. Namely – what is there to figure out – everyone knows and loves Chinese food – but do they? Actually, no. There’s a bunch of research to it. Let me share with you with my thought process.
First Research into Chinese cooking leads me to this: there are in fact 8 traditional “great cuisines” in China. OK – Valid starting point, let’s dig deeper. Huh – it’s actually pretty hard to find recipes (at least in English) that can be ascribed 100% to Zhejiang cooking or Anhui cooking, etc. so this made me a bit skeptic of my approach. Lu cooking (Shandong), the oldest cuisine, and Sichuan cooking, were some of the easier ones to find recipes for but if there’s 8 big ones they should be readily accessible.
Well, not a perfect starting point, in my research I also find out that focusing on the 8 traditional cuisines is not really done anymore these days and another problem does bother me: These 8 traditional cuisines actually ignore a huge part of the country! – OK, let’s see what more there is to it. And of course the answer for a Country of 1.3 billion people is: including the northern, western, etc. regions – Chinese food can be split into so many different regions that it becomes impossible to cover them all.
OK – this brings me to an impasse. Do I do 40-50 weeks of Chinese cooking? That’s an entire year’s worth. Do I focus on the 4 main cuisines, the 8 great cuisines, and ignore for example the entire western part of China?
In the end, I decided to root my research in the research of others and a book that was most heartily endorsed was “All Under Heaven – Recipes from the 35 Cuisines of China” by Carolyn Phillips, who herself lived and trained in China under Chinese chefs. This book, very conveniently, also splits into 5 Chapters – “The North & Manchurian Northeast”, “The Yangtze River and it’s Environs”, “The Coastal Southeast”, “The Central Highlands” and “The Arid Lands”.
So I bought the book and was stunned by the sheer variety of recipes provided. I really recommend it. Every single chapter and every recipe has an in-depth description of the region and its history, as well as personal anecdotes sprinkled in. This, and looking up pictures online of how the dishes are usually presented, gave me all the information I needed to really get going and embark on my biggest cooking day yet.
This week’s menu (2025/6/21)
The Dishes
Given that I took them from a book, I can only recommend getting the book (or e-book, for like 8€/$) it’s really worth it. I am adding a description of each dish below. Should you not want to buy a recipe book, you may also find similar recipes online, I just can’t attest to whether they’ll taste the same.
Appetizer:
Soybean Pods in Shell: On western menus usually served as Edamame
Generally ascribed to Japanese cuisine, Soybean Pods that you pop open and eat the beans out of are also found in China. They set themselves apart from the very pure Japanese recipe of only salting by being boiled with Chinese five-spice and sichuan peppercorns. For the flavors to penetrate into the pods, the top and bottom are snipped off. Serve cold.
Soup:
Tomato Egg Drop soup: as simple as it gets: Recipe by the Woks of Life
This is the one recipe I didn’t take from the book. It’s a very basic chinese recipe that each family will do differently and there’s a myriad of variations online. I linked the one I referenced up top. The soup recipes in the book, while looking delicious, were rather involved and with temperatures being in the high 20s low 30s (80s/90s for my Americans) I really didn’t want to simmer stock for hours. So this summertime recipe came in handy!
Mains:
Sweet and Sour Carp One of Lu Cuisines signature dishes
In lieu of carp, as I couldn’t find any, I ended up using sea bass which was incredibly delicious. The recipe also specified both carp and bass species would work fine. The trick is in deep frying the fish in a wok by holding the tail and going head first. As you’re frying, ladle oil over the top side to cook it a bit and flip the fish. The tail, as you can see since I ripped it is the most fragile part and should be cooked last. Once done, remove most of the oil, fry up the sweet and sour sauce in the same pan and pour all over the fish. Serve immediately.
Braised Prawns, another signature Lu dish!
Braised is, in my opinion, a strong word. You quickly fry up whole prawns (I chopped the head off) just enough to cook. Then you cook the sauce and just for a minute or two, braise the prawns. Serve asap.
Sides/Street Food:
Stir-Fried Potato and Green Chili
This wok-dish is a very welcome new take on potatoes. The potatoes are julienned not too thinly, and soaked to retain their color. You heat up a wok really high and throw them in with oil and thinly sliced chili. They will still have a snap to them as you take them out – as opposed to cooking them until soft – the way we do it in Europe.
Potstickers
This dish will feel the most familiar to western enjoyers to Chinese food. They are, as the name says, pork potstickers, steam-fried to deliciousness. The addition of shao xing rice wine to this recipe added an extra depth of flavor.
Fried Scallion Flatbread
In North China, breads, wheat, etc. actually play a very central role – partly influenced by the proximity to Russia. These scallion flatbreads are flattened into a long shape, filled much like a cinnamon roll (in application not in flavor) and rolled up. Then they are rolled into flatbreads, which ensures even distribution of the scallion-filling. Make sure to fry at a medium temperature, some of mine were a little under in the center.
Jasmine Rice
Steamed. Lightly salted – which I know is not traditional but it is my preference.
Dessert:
Laughing Donut Holes
These sesame donut holes start out as little balls covered in sesame that burst open and increase violently in size as you fry them so do start out small – you will have twice as much as you expect in the end!
To drink I served some Chinese beer and some lovely Jasmine green tea.
This was everything I love in this project. In-depth research, surprises, unknown flavor profiles, diving into a world that you’ve never experienced before, and delicious food. For me, this is my first of likely very few 5/5 ⭐️!
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