Food in China

Interesting Facts for Kids
written by Kids

Here are some interesting facts about food in China, which were chosen and researched by kids especially for kids.

Food in China

China has many delicious foods. Some are famous all over the world, others are as delicious but not very famous.

China is a big country, different parts of China have different food and the ingredients used in the various dishes are diverse.

Some places like sweet food, some like salty food, some like spicy food.  Let's start with Sichuan food.

Hotpot

Hot pot is the famous food in China. It can be found all over China. It was invented in China 2000 years ago.

Hotpot

There is boiling soup in the pot. The boiling soup may be spicy or tomato flavour. When I eat the spicy one, my mouth turn red, my tongue is hot and numb. I feel like I’m boiling.

Everyone can eat together around one pot.We can put meat and vegetables in the pot. We eat them while we cook them. We can chat, sing and play games while eating hot pot. We are so happy.

Hot pot dipping sauces include green onion, garlic, sesame oil and so on. We can put whatever we like in it.

Hui Guo Rou | Twice Cooked Pork

What we call "Hui Guo Rou" is twice-cooked pork. To make this dish, we need pork and garlic sprouts. 

Twice cooked pork

The main ingredients are Douban sauce, sweet sauce, soy bean oil and ginger. The soul of this dish is Douban sauce made from beans. The sauce tastes sweet, salty and a little spicy.

Sichuan has a lot of delicious food, like hot pot, Kung Pao Chicken and other dishes. 

Zhua Fan | Muslim Lamb Rice

Zhua Fan is a fried rice dish with red and yellow carrot, onion and mutton.

Zhua Fan

This dish was created by a doctor. He was always sick, so he used rice, oil, mutton, red and yellow carrot and onion and fried them. Soon, the doctor became healthy, so he told his friends about the dish. 

Da Pan Ji | Big Plate Chicken

There is an interesting dish called Da Pan Ji which means 'Chicken in the Big Plate'. This food is cooked with a spicy sauce, chicken, potato and onion.

Da Pan Ji

This is a huge meal on one plate with chicken, vegetables and noodles! Actually, the noodles are 'hidden' under the chicken and sauce. 

Or as Annie wrote, you eat up all the chicken, you can cook some noodles and put them on the big plate, so there is a new dish!

Nang | Flatbread

There are some tasty dishes in Xinjiang. Nang is a very soft flatbread.

Xianjiang Nang Flat bread

Nang and baked buns are baked in a hole in the ground or in a special oven.

Zao Cha | Morning Tea

People in Guangdong province like sweet and salty food. They like to have "Zao Cha", which is a meal between breakfast and lunch, just like brunch in the western countries.

Steamed dim sum dumplings

There are many dim sums, such as shrimp dumpling, called shao-mai, steamed custard bun and roast pigeon in Zaocha. There is also a lot of choice of desserts. 

Yang Zhi Gan Lu | Mango sago

In Guangdong, there is also a lot of choice of desserts. Chilled mango sago cream with pomelo is my favorite. 

Mango Pomelo Sago - a popular dessert

There is a story for the dessert. A chef was reading a book. Then he saw a picture of Guanyin.

Guanyin is not a real person, Chinese people think Guanyin is goddess of mercy. In the book, Guanyin was holding a jade bottle in one hand, and in the other hand was a willow branch. Guanyin was helping the people in a drought by spreading the water in the bottle over the dry area.

The person who created the dessert thought this story was a good story, so he named the mango sago cream with pomelo as "Yang Zhi Gan Lu".

This article about 'Food in China' was provided by Lisa Yeo and her students from Chengdu: Annie Jiang, age 8 and  Abby Song, age 8 (Hotpot). Thank you so much for this wonderful article! Great work!

Where is Chengdu? Chengdu is located centrally in Sichuan/ China. Chengdu is the capital of the province of Sichuan and is home to about 20 million inhabitants.

Popular Pages

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Food in China | Resources

• Miriam Hoffmann. "Chinese Food for Kids". China Family Adventure. Last accessed 20 December 2021.
  
• Central Intelligence Agency. "China" CIAWorldFactBook. Last updated 14 December 2021. Last accessed 16 December 2021

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And enjoy learning more great Facts about China soon!

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