Xiang Cuisine, or Hunan Cuisine, also known as Honmai Cuisine in the Changsha area, is one of the eight major cuisines in China with a long history, and the cuisine has been formed as early as in the Han Dynasty. It is based on the three local flavors of the Xiangjiang River Basin, the Dongting Lake area and the mountainous areas of western Hunan.

The Hunan cuisine is fine, with a wide range of materials, flavors and varieties; color and lustre on the oil heavy color, affordable; taste on the focus on spicy, fresh, soft and tender; method of simmering, stewing, wax, steaming, stir-frying method is known.

Tan Yan loosen and his family chef created an important cuisine of Hunan cuisine in the Republican period - the Groupan Hunan Cuisine. With the culinary concept of "excellent selection of raw materials, fine handling of knives, exquisite cooking techniques, and precise flavor blending", the Groupan Hunan Cuisine has won people's favor and is known as "the source of Hunan Cuisine", and the Groupan Hunan Cuisine is a famous series and an important school of Hunan Cuisine.

The cuisine of Chinese food culture refers to a set of self-contained cooking techniques and flavors that have evolved over a long period of time in a certain region due to the differences in climate, geography, history, products and dietary customs, and have been recognized as local cuisines throughout the country.

As early as the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, China's dietary culture has been in its infancy, to the most representative of the Taigongwang, and then to the Spring and Autumn and Warring States period of Duke Huan of Qi, the food culture of the north and south of the flavor of the dishes on the performance of the differences. By the time of Tang and Song dynasties, the southern food and northern food formed their own systems. By the time of the Southern Song Dynasty, the pattern of southern sweet and northern salty was formed.

Developing to the early Qing Dynasty, Lu Cuisine, Sichuan Cuisine, Cantonese Cuisine, Su Cuisine, became the most influential local dishes, known as the "four major cuisine". By the end of the Qing Dynasty, Zhejiang cuisine, Fujian cuisine, Hunan cuisine, Anhui cuisine, four new local cuisine differentiation formation, *** with the composition of the traditional Chinese diet of the "eight cuisines".

In addition to the eight major cuisines, there are some more influential subdivided cuisines in China, such as Chaozhou cuisine, northeastern cuisine, the local cuisine, Gan cuisine, Chu cuisine, Beijing cuisine, Tianjin cuisine, Hebei cuisine, Henan cuisine, Hakka cuisine and so on.

Baidu Encyclopedia - Hunan Cuisine

Baidu Encyclopedia - The Eight Cuisines