Full Description
China in Seven Banquets ranges through 5,000 years of China's food history in seven iconic meals, from the ancient Eight Treasures fête to the 'Tail-Burning Banquet' of the Tang Dynasty and the Qing court's extravagant 'Complete Manchu-Han Feast'. We also experience lavish repasts from literature and film, a New Year's buffet from 1920s Shanghai and a delivery menu from the hyperglobal twenty-first century, even peeking into the tables of the not-too-distant future. Drawing on decades of experience eating his way around China, Beijing-based historian Thomas David DuBois explains why culinary fashions come and go, and recreates dozens of historical recipes in a modern kitchen. From fermented elk to absinthe cocktails, this is Chinese food as you've never seen it before.
Contents
A Note for My Fellow Historians, and for Everyone Else
Introduction: What Is Food History?
Of Meat and Morality: The Eight Treasures of Zhou
By Silk Road and High Sea: New Foods Come to China
Gardens of Delight: Imperial China's High Cuisine
Fancy Foods and Foreign Fads
'Life's a Banquet': Food Culture in the Go-Go '90s
Franchise Fever: The Price of Efficiency
And Beyond . . .
List of Featured Recipes
Weights and Measures
Timeline of Major Dynasties
References
Select Bibliography
Acknowledgements
Photo Acknowledgements
Index
