China has a long history, a vast territory and a large population, thus forming a rich and colorful food culture. We can understand the types of catering culture in China from the perspectives of dieters, regions and seasons.

Types of dieters

1. Palace and noble diet

First of all, the characteristics of the palace diet are strict selection of materials and strict use of materials. All over the world, is it the land of the king, the land of the land, the infinite expansion of the power of the princes and emperors, which makes them gather all the skilled chefs in the world and have all the rare raw materials in the world. For example, as early as the Zhou Dynasty, the imperial court had a detailed and complicated person in charge of the emperor's diet. In "Zhou Li Zhu Shu Tian Guan Zhu Zai", there were "cooks, men, foreigners, heng people, Dian Shi, orcs, fishermen, wax people, food doctors, disease doctors, doctors, wine makers, drinkers, and doctors." With so many full-time staff, it is conceivable that the food selection and preparation were strict at that time. Among them, there are only six kinds of bird's nest dishes:

bird's nest chicken skin ★ fish balls, bird's nest all-silver duck, bird's nest five-willow chicken shreds, bird's nest white duck shreds, bird's nest mushroom duck soup, and bird's nest fried chicken shreds.

secondly, the cooking is fine. The political forces that dominate the world provide the rulers with the possibility of enjoying all kinds of rare and beautiful diets, and also require the court diet to be as meticulous as possible in cooking; The monotonous and boring court life has made most emperors weak, which requires them to be more meticulous in the processing and production of diet.

Thirdly, there are many varieties of colors. According to Deling, a female official of Cixi, on the train from Beijing to Fengtian, the temporary "imperial dining room" occupied four carriages, with "5 stoves" and "5 cooks" on it, with a total of "* * * preparing 1 kinds of main dishes" for each meal, as well as "cakes, fruits and food". In addition to dinner, "there are two snacks" and "there are at least 2 bowls of dishes in each snack, usually around 4 or 5 bowls", and all these dishes cannot be repeated, so you can imagine the variety of court diets.

The huge scale, multifarious types, precious materials and numerous kitchen services of the court will inevitably bring great extravagance and waste in manpower, material resources and financial resources.

Although the official aristocratic diet is not as extravagant, rigid and luxurious as the palace diet, it is also a competition for wealth, and it is characterized by paying attention to the "exotic cuisine" and "the treasure of poor land and water".

Confucian cuisine and Tan Jiacai are the most famous aristocratic diets. Throughout the ages, Confucius has set up special internal kitchens and external kitchens. In the long-term development process, it has formed a diet dish with exquisite diet, nutrition and unique flavor. This is no different from the influence of Confucius and Old Master Q's ancestral motto, "Never tire of eating essence, never tire of being meticulous".

Another feature of Confucius Banquet is that both the name of the dish and the utensils have a strong cultural flavor. For example, "Shrimp with Jade Belt" shows the honor of Confucius' position. On the utensils, in addition to specially making some artistic utensils, ancient poems corresponding to the shape of the utensils are also engraved. For example, on the pipa-shaped bowl, "Bi Sha waits for the moon and spring to adjust treasures, and red sleeves add fragrance to read at night" is engraved. All these convey the cultural taste of the first restaurant in the world.

Another famous and well-preserved aristocratic diet is Tan Jiacai. Tan Jiazu was born in Guangdong and lived in Beijing for a long time. Therefore, his dishes are a combination of North and South cooking. They belong to Guangdong series and have a strong Beijing flavor, and they enjoy a high reputation in Beijing in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China. Tan Jiacai's main features are a wide range of materials, strange and ingenious production techniques, especially for cooking all kinds of seafood. Tan Jiacai's main production essentials are seasoning and paying attention to the original flavor of raw materials, refreshing with sweetness and introducing fragrance with saltiness; Pay attention to the harsh blanking and sufficient heat, so the dishes are easy to be soft and rotten when cooked, and the entrance tastes good and easy to digest; The selection and processing of materials are relatively fine, and cooking methods are often used, such as burning, leaning on fire, stewing, stewing, steaming, grilling, frying and roasting. In the long-term development, aristocratic diet has formed its own unique style and highly personalized production methods.

2. Market and people's diet

The characteristics of market diet are various and varied. For example, there are 839 kinds of cooked food in Lin 'an in the Southern Song Dynasty recorded in Dream Liang Lu. As far as cooking methods are concerned, there are only 19 categories of steaming, boiling, boiling, brewing, frying, frying, baking, frying, roasting, simmering, preserved, waxed, roasted, frozen, sauce, stir-fried and firebird recorded in Mengliang Record, and there are several kinds under each category. At that time, the diet not only met the dietary needs of people from different classes, but also took into account the dietary needs at different times. Because the objects of the market diet were mainly the merchants who were sitting at home and selling husbands and pawns at that time, and these people came and went in a hurry, and their movements were uncertain, so all kinds of popular snacks that were convenient to eat and carry were extremely popular.

3. Ethnic and religious diet

Ethnic diet refers to the dishes of ethnic minorities except Han nationality. Due to the different social and historical development classes, different regions, environments, products and religious beliefs, almost every ethnic minority has its own different dietary customs and hobbies, and finally formed a unique dietary culture.

The ethnic minorities living between the Baishan and Heishui in Northeast China and the Sanjiang Plain mainly include Manchu, Hezhe, Oroqen and Ewenki. Manchu mainly settled in farming, with hunting as a subsidiary. Manchu people's favorite food is "Fu rou" (boiled white meat with clear water). They mainly eat jiaozi and "Nian Bo" during the Chinese New Year, and the delicious food in winter is hot pot with white meat and sauerkraut. Hezhe people mainly hunt. Because of the cold climate, they mainly eat fish and animals, and the most prominent one is the "killing fish" that mixes raw fish with seasoning. The Oroqen and Ewenki people who live in the Daxing 'an Mountains take hunting as their main source of food, and especially like to eat raw dog liver and half-baked animal meat.