The Emperor’s Feast by Jonathan Clements review – the story of Chinese food
Jonathan Clements grew up in Southend-on-Sea. In the 1970s, his father played drums in a local Chinese restaurant, the Garden of China, “an odd mixture of industrial chic and orientalist kitsch”. As children they ate there regularly (“my brother cut his teeth gnawing spare ribs”) and Chinese food has been “a constant pleasure and addiction” for Clements ever since, propelling him into a career studying east Asian history and culture.
The Emperor’s Feast tells the story of Chinese food, starting 3,000 years ago with the Book of Rites (Liji), attributed to Confucius, which described meals as the thing that “separated savagery from civilisation – the raw from the cooked”. But Clements also cleverly uses food – the part of Chinese culture with which many western people are most familiar – as a way of charting the complex history of China, a vast country made up of many peoples, cultures and cuisines.
According to Clements, there are barely a dozen words for cooking processes in English. But in Chinese there are 26 verbs for preparing food, from stir-frying to cooking in embers (wei) and baking in moist clay (baozai). Its ancient cuisine reflects China’s long history of invasion and conquest, as each new emperor has sought to unify this diverse land.
Modern Chinese cooking brings together many regional and foreign influences, from the fresh seafood of Fujian province in the south to the love of roast meat in the north (“the Manchus ate little else”). Even the habit of eating rice varies across China: in the wheat-growing north, rice formed only 1% of the diet in the 20th century, whereas in the south it was a quarter of all calories.
China’s deep suspicion of foreign foods is reflected in their names: tomato was fan qie or “barbarian eggplant”; and red chilli was fan jiao, “barbarian pepper”. But Sichuan adopted the chilli and its food is now renowned for its spiciness. Even Chairman Mao was a fan, telling his doctor: “If you are afraid of chillis in your bowl how will you dare to attack your enemies.”
Clements has clearly travelled widely in China and sometimes I wanted him to use more of his personal experiences. But despite this, the book is rich with historical and contemporary examples of food and feasting.
Tea drinking became fashionable in the 870s, during the Tang dynasty: “chá” was drunk in cups not much bigger than thimbles, for – according to a contemporary guide to tea etiquette – “moderation is the virtue of tea”. At the same time it became popular among tea drinkers to eat delicious snacks called touches of the heart (dian xin), “better known abroad by the Tang-era pronunciation preserved in the tea-making, brunch-munching culture of the Cantonese: dim sum”.
Delicacies included pig’s brains, steamed civet with sliced pears, and dolphin testicles – fit for a Manchu emperor
A surviving 18th-century menu from Yangzhou included 108 courses, although Clements notes they were not intended (as some assumed) to be eaten at one sitting. As well as more familiar dishes, it contained such exotic delicacies as pig’s brains, camel hump, steamed civet with sliced pears, dolphin testicles, goose gizzards and minced pigeon. A modern Beijing restaurant offers its diners the chance to experience a banquet such as this, which would have been fit for a Manchu emperor. Fortunately the experience is spread over the course of a year, but it will still set gourmands back some £44,000.
Today Chinese food is a global phenomenon. There are some 40,000 Chinese restaurants in the US – more than McDonald’s, Burger King and Pizza Hut combined. However, many dishes offered in restaurants outside east Asia have little to do with traditional Chinese cooking. The stew offered in early 20th-century western Chinatowns called “chop suey” (from the Cantonese term for leftovers, tsap seui) appalled Chinese visitors, such as Liang Qichao in 1903: “It is terribly cooked and no Chinese would eat it.” Today epicures can enjoy such inauthentic Chinese delicacies as Sichuan alligator at restaurants in Louisiana, and haggis spring rolls in Edinburgh.
This is a splendid introduction to the cooking and history of China, filled with surprising details on the origins of many famous dishes, including the fact that Peking roast duck (Beijing kaoya) originated before the 14th century in Nanjing, whose residents still regard its modern name as “an act of dastardly cultural appropriation”.
• The Emperor’s Feast by Jonathan Clements is published by Hodder & Stoughton (£20). To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
