China's Food Author:Reinhart Wolf From the dust jacket: — “China’s Food” is a lavish, extraordinary photo essay. Photographer Reinhart Wolf journeyed for three months through the People’s Republic of China to explore and discover how and why the foods eaten there are grown, chosen, bought, prepared, and served. From farm to market to kitchen to table, Chin... more »a’s food is entwined with history, philosophy, economics—the soul of Chinese society. Food is symbol and sustenance, its meaning braided together with how it looks, tastes and nourishes.
In the foods of China, all elements join. The line between food and medicine blurs: the prescription room of a Chinese pharmacy resembles a kitchen. A stand of bamboo yields stout poles for building, light rods for carrying, and tender shoots for tonight’s dinner,
In China, food is more than just something to eat. It carries the myths and traditions of Imperial culture. The dragon, symbol of good luck, cavorts on ancient temples in inlaid ivory and gilt; the same dragon appears at any banquet, exquisitely assembled from morsels of egg and vegetable.
China’s food undergoes whimsical, elegant transformations: a whole fish is artfully carved and twisted into a gargantuan flower. Even China’s basics, wheat, rice, and dofu, the bland bean curd bedrock diet protein, are ingeniously boiled, fried, steamed, baked, carved, twisted, spiced, filled, flattened, wrapped, tied and dried into noodles, buns, breads, sheets, blocks, strips and coils.
The Chinese demand their food fresh, preferably still alive. The noisy, bustling markets are a chaos of cages and baskets of live fish, chickens, pigs, ducks, dogs, snakes, birds, crabs, weasels. Without the luxury of food taboos, China has learned to eat anything.
“China’s Food” captures this spirit with a cascade of lush images highlighted by a witty, informative text. Though not designed as a cookbook, it holds selected recipes, so any cook can sample the flavors of China at home. These run from the most basic, for perfect plain rice, to the sophisticated textures of Heng Yang Spicy Scallops.
The varied pattern of culture, life and mind that comes together in the foods of China is never hidden. Parts of it are visible everywhere. And all of it is here in “China’s Food”.« less