Chinese culinary arts

In China, cooking is an art. Quite different from Western cooking where recipes are followed strictly like laboratory instructions, Chinese cooking always allows for a creative and stylistic touch to it. While in Western cooking the recipe is the key to success in any culinary attempt, in Chinese cooking the experienced and well seasoned-chef is the guarantee. That is why restaurants, big or small, would always boast of their chefs as well as advertise their dishes.

"Colorful," "varied," "delicious," and "complex" are often used to describe Chinese food. Great attention is paid to aesthetic appreciation of the food because the food should be good not only in flavor and smell, but also in color and appearance.

The principal aspects of Chinese culinary art are: selection of raw material, combination of ingredients, cutting, seasoning, temperature and cooking techniques.