China's long history, vast territory and extensive contact with other nation and cultures have given birth to the distinctive Chinese culinary art. With several thousand years of creation and accumulation, the Chinese cuisine has become increasingly popular among gourmets worldwide.
The three essential factors or key elements by which Chinese cooking is judged are known as "color, aroma and taste". The color of Chinese food, the first of these elements which is so evident in a Chinese banquet, includes the layout and design of the dishes, best exemplified in particular by the large elaborately-prepared cold dish serves at the beginning of the dinner. "Aroma" implies more than what one's nose can detect directly; it also includes the freshness of the raw materials used and the blending of seasoning. "Taste" is the art proper seasoning, though it also involves the texture of food and the fine slicing techniques. These three essential elements color, aroma and taste, are achieved by the careful coordination of a series of delicate activities: selecting ingredients mixing flavors timing the cooking controlling the heat and finally, laying out the food on the plate for the table.
Visitors to china are often surprised when a typical dinner for a table of eight people consists of four courses of cold dishes, four courses of hot dishes, couple with soup and steamed rice; they consider this a lavish spread. But in the Chinese mind, a dinner prepare as above for guests in the minimum requirement. A standard banquet will consist of four to eight prepared cold dishes, eight hot dishes served one at s time, two or four whole-sized showpiece dishes, such as a whole fish or a whole suckling pig. In addition to soups steamed rice and pastries. The dinner finishes up with fruit. Overseas visitors should remember that it is often unnecessary to eat more a single mouthful of a dish at a Chinese banquet.
