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If you happen to travel in China and/or my hometown, Hong Kong, you will realize that
there are tons of restaurants serving all the cusines in the world. But here, we will concentrate on the Chinese restaurants,
such as Cantonese, Shanghai, Peking, Sichuan and Wild Game.
These 5 are the most popular kinds. Only the
5th one can be found in the Mainland China.
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1. Cantonese
Cantonese dishes mostly originated from southern
China, such as Guangzhou and Hong Kong. A few restaurants are even more specific in certain areas of dishes, like Chiu
Chau (where my father's family came from) and Hunan.
Cantonese dishes are also sometimes influenced by other
countries' cuisines which became those restaurants serving fusion dishes.
The most popular and well-known Cantonese
dishes are sweet and sour pork, roasted pork and dim sum.
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2. Shanghai
Shanghai restaurants serve a lot of Chinese
style bread, dumplings and noodles because northern China produces more wheat than rice. The color of the dishes is
usually white because of the above mentioned food. Plus, Chinese prefer steamed food. The bread and dumplings served in this style are mostly steamed.
The potstickers you buy in the grocery
stores with thick wrapping is the Shanghai style dumplings.
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3. Peking (a.k.a. Beijing)
Peking style restaurants
also serve many wheat products. Therefore, you may realize that some restaurants in Hong Kong serve both Shanghai and
Peking style dishes at the same time.
But traditional Peking restaurants serve Peking duck. It is a roasted
duck with a super crispy sking. The server always bring out the duck in front of the customers and slice the skin which
will be wrapped with Chinese pancakes and a dipping sauce served along the side. The rest of the duck will be brought
back into the kitchen and shred the meat to make "Moo Shu" duck.
Another popular dish is hot pot serving
boiled lamb. The design of that hot pot is very special. The funnel is in the middle allowing the burning of the charcoal
which will heat up the broth or water around in order to cook the meat.
The third popular dish is "Choi Bon Hai" which is stir-fried egg white sprinkled some chopped dried scallops on top together with a raw egg york. Mix everything together and serve.
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4. Sichuan
Sichuan restaurants serve hot and spicy dishes.
As you may know already if you had ordered any Sichuan dishes from your favorite Chinese restaurants. The reason why
they serve hot and spicy food because of the geography of this area. It is a basin which partially affect the climatic
condition that people believe the hot and spicy food is good for their health. One well-known dish from this area is
"Ma Po" Tofu.
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5. Wild Game
This kind of restaurant only exists in
the Mainland China. Back in the Shang dynasty (around 1,600 - 1,046 B.C.), wild game was very popular, especially in
the royal family. It included tiger, elephant and any kind of meat. Part of it because of the lifestyle at that
time was still like the tribes.
In Hong Kong, the only wild game is snake. The snake stew is a very
popular dish in winter time. It is believed that after finishing a bowl of snake soup will keep you warm.
In
Mainland China, wild game animals include wild goose, pangolin, turtle, masked civet, wild boar, pheasant, raccoon dog, rabbit
and sometimes domestic pets.
Nowadays, people eating wild games illegally not because of the meal is expensive
for them to show off, but it is believed that the wild games are good for their health.
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