cultivated heavily in the south.

Today, however, this distinction among eating habits is in-

creasingly blurred as geographical barriers are giving way to improved transportation of
goods and eased migration of people throughout the country.
The Chinese also have their particular breakfast favorites, which vary greatly from re-
gion to region. For example, the Tianjinese prefer jianbing guozi (battered cakes cooked
with eggs and served with plum sauce, green onions, and deep-fried dough), the Beijingese
like douzhi (soybean milk) and youtiao (deep-fried twisted dough sticks), and the Shang-
hainese favor paofan (soup of cooked rice) and shengjian (fried dumplings).
A long history has taught the Chinese to prepare their food in a great many ways, jian
(dry-fry), chao (stir-fry), peng (instant-fry), zha (deep-fry), zheng (steam), shao (roast), zhu
(boil), and dun (stew) being only a few of them. Traditionally, rural Chinese cook their
meals in a huge iron pot sitting on a clay stove, with bellows to boost the combustion of
plant fuel like dried corn and wheat stalks. City residents first used coal stoves and now use
gas ranges to prepare their meals. Neither the clay stove nor the gas range has an oven. The
Chinese seldom roast and bake their food at home. Instead, they boil and steam the food that
they want well cooked.
Chinese food differs from that of America in many ways. When asked about these dif-
ferences, an observant American friend, whom I once entertained at my home in China,
said, We cut the food as we eat, but you cut it up before you cook!
Following are recipes for some traditional Chinese food and snacks, along with a few
home-cooked dishes. Nearly all the ingredients required in the recipes are available in
Asian groceries.

Jiaozi (Dumplings)
Introduction
Historically, the Chinese used
tiangan (ten heavenly stems) in combina-
tion with dizhi (twelve earthly branches)
to designate years, months, days, and
hours. The time of zi, the first of the
twelve-branched dizhi, corresponds to a
time between eleven oclock in the eve-
ning and one oclock in the morning. The
Chinese jiao means join. Hence, the
two-syllable word jiaozi refers to mid-
nightthe hour that connects the two
hours across a new day. The term has be-
come the name of the food eaten to cele-
brate the arrival of the Chinese New
Year.

36 Part 2: Food, Games, and Crafts