Similarities and Differences in Dietary Practices:

The traditional dietary practices of the Chinese people are based on plant-based foods. The staple food is grains and cereals, and the supplementary food is vegetables, plus a small amount of meat. The main reason for this custom is that China has agricultural production as its main mode of economic production. The predominance of hot, cooked food is also a major feature of Chinese dietary practices. This is related to the early enlightenment of Chinese civilization and the development of cooking technology. Ancient Chinese people believe that: "water inhabits the fishy, meat shame, grass food is stink." Hot food, cooked food can be "fishy to remove shame in addition to dank" ("Lu Shi Chunqiu" this flavor ").

Westerners have inherited the cultural lineage of nomadic, seafaring people, mainly fishing, hunting and farming, supplemented by gathering and planting, more meat, food, clothing, and use are taken from animals. Westerners in the introduction of their own country's dietary characteristics, feel more than China to pay more attention to the rational mix of nutrition, although the taste of the same, but to save time, and good nutrition, so their country's people are generally more robust than the Chinese body: tall, long legs, broad shoulders, well-developed muscles; while the Chinese people appear to be thin, narrow shoulders, short legs, yellow color and texture of the weak. Of course, it makes no sense for Westerners to use the differences between Chinese and Western foods to determine the nutritional superiority of each side's diet.

Some people, based on the obvious difference between Chinese and Western dietary objects, refer to Chinese people as plant characters and Westerners as animal characters.

The similarities and differences of dietary concepts:

Chinese is a concept of aesthetic diet. The key to the unique charm of Chinese food lies in its flavor. And the production of delicious, lies in the harmonization, to make the food of the original flavor, after heating the cooked flavor, plus ingredients and auxiliary ingredients of the flavor and seasoning of the taste of harmony, interweaving and fusion and coordination together, so that they complement each other, mutual help penetration, water and milk blending, you have me, I have you. Chinese cooking emphasizes the beauty of harmony, which is the essence of Chinese culinary art. The shape and color of the dishes is something external, but the taste is something internal, heavy internal and not deliberately modify the appearance, heavy dishes taste but not too much to show the shape and color of the dishes, which is the most important performance of the Chinese beauty of the concept of food.

Compared with the flavor of Chinese food, Western food is a rational concept of food. Western cooking emphasizes nutrition and ignores flavor. They eat with cold drinks, chilled cold wine and then add ice, and the surface of the tongue all over the taste nerves after the chilled, will be a great loss of taste sensitivity, and gradually can not discern the flavor; that with the blood of the steak and white fish, white meat, raw vegetables, although rich in nutrients, but there is no "taste". All these reflect the neglect of the Western sense of taste.

The similarities and differences in eating styles:

In terms of eating styles, the Chinese also have their own characteristics, which is the polyvalent system. Gathering food system has a very early origin, from the excavation of many underground cultural relics can be seen, the ancient cooking room and gathering place is unified, cooking room in the center of the house, on the skylight out of the smoke, under the bonfire, cooking on the fire, on the fire gathered around the fire eaters. This ancient custom of gathering food has been extended to later generations. The long-standing tradition of gathering and eating is a reflection of the importance China attaches to blood relations and the concept of the family in the way of eating.

The most obvious difference from the Chinese way of eating is the popular Western buffet. This method is to display all the food one by one, we all take what you need, do not have to be fixed in the seat to eat, walk around freely, this way to facilitate the exchange of emotions between individuals, but also shows the Westerners on the personality, respect for the self. But each eat each, do not disturb each other, lack of Chinese chat happy **** happy mood.

The similarities and differences in eating utensils:

A major feature of Chinese eating customs is the use of chopsticks. Chopsticks, called chopsticks in ancient times, have a long history in China. In the Book of Rites, it was said, "The rice and millet were not served with chopsticks." This shows that chopsticks have been used for eating at least since the Yin Shang era. In fact, the origin of chopsticks in the Oriental countries is mostly from China. The invention of chopsticks by Chinese ancestors is indeed a great contribution to human civilization.

Westerners, on the other hand, use a knife and fork as their main eating utensils, holding the fork in their left hand and the knife in their right hand to cut the food and then put it into their mouths with the fork.

In comparison, the Chinese diet tends to be artistic, and therefore focuses on the external performance of dishes from color, aroma, and taste; the Western diet does not have such a deep cultural heritage as China's, and therefore does not focus on its artistry, but more from the nutritional point of view to consider the structure of the dishes and food ingredients.

In short, Chinese and Western cuisines can be described as complex and simple, respectively.