Talking with Fuchsia Dunlop: One Englishwoman's Take on Food in China Today
Nobody I know of in the West understands more about food in China than Fuchsia Dunlop. The author of two remarkable Chinese cookbooks, Land of Plenty (about Sichuan food), and The Revolutionary Cookbook (about Hunanese cooking), Dunlop was not only the first Westerner to attend the Sichuan Institute of Higher Cuisine, she spent the better part of the last 14 years traveling through China to explore the food culture. So when her newest book, Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China, was published a few months ago, I knew it was going to be good. I just wasn't prepared for how good.
The book is an evocative and emotionally resonant account of her visits to China, from the time she first went as a student in 1994 to the many trips she took after to research for her two cookbooks. In traveling around the country, Dunlop discovered just how much her feelings about Chinese food had evolved in tandem with how the cultural fabric of China had evolved in the post-Mao era.
As this go-go, free enterprise period unfolded, Dunlop became profoundly aware and disturbed by all the attendant environmental problems and food safety issues that accompanied all this "progress." She found herself questioning her love for and commitment to Chinese food culture. Dunlop's restless quest to make peace with a rapidly evolving China is at the heart of her journey and this book. I won't give away the ending, but sweet and sour is an apt description for the conclusion.
Starting this Friday through the weekend, we'll be giving away five copies of this terrific memoir. Stay tuned for details, and read more about my conversation with Dunlop a few months back over dinner at Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York—which she loved, for the record.
She begged me not to force her into a Sichuan restaurant like I did a few years ago when she was promoting Land of Plenty (we had an incredible meal at Grand Sichuan Eastern on 55th Street and Second Avenue in New York, where the chef was beside himself to speak about Sichuan cuisine in Chinese with a young Englishwoman).
Most recently, we did have a free-flowing discussion about the book and yesterday I sent her a few extra questions to learn even more:
What is the most important thing you learned about China and its food in the time you spent there? Never to underestimate it. Chinese food culture continues to amaze me with its diversity and sophistication, even after about fifteen years of culinary research. There always seems to be something else to explore, whether in terms of regional flavours, culinary techniques, ingredients, or different ways of eating. I could never have imagined how endlessly fascinating this journey of discovery would be!
Related to that, what's the one thing you'd like people to know about food in China? That it can be not only delicious, but also incredibly healthy. The Chinese know how to eat, perhaps more than people in any other culture, in the sense of both of enjoying their food and of nourishing their bodies and minds.
What would your ideal Chinese meal be composed of? I would have slow-cooked pork prepared by the Song Dynasty poet Su Dongpo, stir-fried bamboo shoots gathered from a hillside in northern Fujian, fish-fragrant aubergines from the former Bamboo Bar in Chengdu, stir-fried amaranth leaves with garlic, chicken soup made by the mother of my Hunanese friend Fan Qun, and a bowl of simple rice porridge made by the private cook of the famous eighteenth-century food writer Yuan Mei.
What is the biggest misconception people have about food in China and Chinese food in general? That Chinese food is unhealthy and junky. Most people I know in China eat, at home, a fantastically balanced diet dominated by grains and vegetables, with a little meat, fish or poultry. And the cooking at the finest restaurants (not to mention the décor and the service) is incredibly good.
If people are visiting Bar Shu, the restaurant you consult for in London, what should they order if they're an adventurous or unadventurous eater? Adventurous eaters tend to adore the man-and-wife offal slices, fire exploded kidney flowers, fragrant chicken in a pile of chillies and, if they want to splash out, the boiled sea bass with sizzling chili oil. Less adventurous people won’t be able to resist the Gong Bao prawns with cashews, dry-fried green beans or fish-fragrant aubergines.
Related
Video: Fuchsia Dunlop Prepares General Tso's Chicken
Fuchsia Dunlop's General Tso's Chicken Recipe
Serious Eats' Cookbook Interview with Fuchsia Dunlop
Joe DiStefano and Fuchsia Dunlop Take on Flushing's Golden Shopping Mall
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9 Comments:
Yay Fuschia!
salty at 12:07PM on 07/31/08
I am so glad there are Chinese food lovers/experts that are helping others realize not all Chinese food is oil-laden and "junky." Chinese cuisine is much like other cultures - rich, fatty foods are primarily for celebratory affairs, which are intended to be over-the-top. The average daily meals consist of mostly quick-fried vegetables, pickled relishes, broth-based soups and/or rice. There are obviously regional variations, but for the most part, daily Chinese food is quite healthy.
JustNancy at 2:26PM on 07/31/08
"Most people I know in China eat, at home, a fantastically balanced diet dominated by grains and vegetables, with a little meat, fish or poultry" -- Fuchisia Dunlop
Sorry to be a party pooper but a diet dominated by grains cannot be healthy when you throw away the vitamins and roughage in that grain. I refer to eating white rice rather than brown. And where the Chinese eat wheat it too is milled and the bran removed
I know exactly why the Chinese do this and....
I don't idealize peoples who massacre their staple foods
Yes the West is worse but at least we have many people who know whole grains are better and do their best to consume them.
gaffer at 2:36PM on 07/31/08
I would not be so quick assume that the reason white rice is popularly consumed in China is ignorance of the nutritional benefits of whole grains. Eating wholesome, healthy foods is a primary focus of Chinese cuisine. It is a simple matter of preference that most Chinese people eat white rice, since the flavor of brown rice is typically undesirable to the Chinese palate.
Speaking as a first generation Chinese American who grew up being scolded for leaving a teaspoon of rice in my bowl, I find Gaffer's comments regarding the wanton attitude of the Chinese people to our staple food to be extremely narrow minded, sanctimonious, and ignorant. It is precisely because of rice's importance to the Chinese diet that throwing any bit of it away is seen as extremely disrespectful.
sz434 at 3:19PM on 07/31/08
LOL
I'm sanctimonious? Would it make you happy if I said that Europeans Americans Caucasians etc are as foolish not to be eating whole wheat bread and other whole grains. These grains were as much a staple food as rice is in the orient
You are the narrow minded person for dismissing brown rice on the basis of taste. When times get tough Asians are forced to revert back to the healthier whole grain rice. This happened during WW2 in many Asian nations. Just last month the Filipino government encouraged its people to go back to the cheaper unmilled rice
BTW I practice what I preach. I eat whole grains 90% of the time
And I'm going to give you a freebie--->>
You don't build civilizations on milled grains
gaffer at 3:52PM on 07/31/08
SZ434 could not be more correct. American's have developed this strange -- and somewhat mystical --concept that all food serve as medicine, and needs be eaten in a way that is "healthful." Luckily for them, the Chinese suffer from no such affliction. To me, eating brown rice is like eating an orange with the peel left on. For those that enjoy such things, and get a kick out of the feeling of superiority it gives them, feel very free. Others can eat their food the way they best enjoy it.
Makanmata at 5:11PM on 07/31/08
Hi gaffer, you say that, "I know exactly why the Chinese do this...." Could you please elaborate?
Wan Yan Ling at 2:31AM on 08/01/08
Ed -
I'm a fan of this site and of your writings, but I really think you dropped the ball with this interview. On May 12, 2008, as I am sure you are aware, an 8.0 earthquake hit Sichuan province, 80 km from its capitol Chengdu, killing 70,000 people, injuring 400,000, and leaving as many as 11 million homeless.
I am assuming that with all the years she lived in this very area, Fuschia would have much to say about the earthquake and its aftermath, but somehow the subject did not seem to come to mind in during your interview, or at least it did not make it into the printed version. Given the level of death and destruction this earthquake left in its wake, it's hard not to see that as pretty callous.
dikaryon at 8:18AM on 08/02/08
@dikaryon: It is callous not to mention an earthquake in a food interview? It doesn't seem like it would be relevant to the conversation at hand (about the food in China).
pbisNOTmyname at 10:22PM on 08/02/08