Being one of the most influential genres of Cantonese culinary culture, Shunde Cuisine has long been recognized as the food capital in Guangdong. The saying “食在广州，厨出凤城”(The delicious foods come from Canton and the cooks come from Shunde) exemplifies the impacts of Shunde cooking style. Given the limitation of resources and the traditional forms of economy, Shunde Cuisine emphasizes on making the best foods out of local and ordinary produce. Since its establishment as a county under Ming Dynasty, Shunde’s economy relied heavily on fish farming and sericulture. The production cycle surrounding fish ponds and silkworm farms created a special agricultural phenomenon as well as a unique culinary scene. Shunde cuisine values freshness and umami tastes that comes from the produce itself. There is seldom heavy seasonings nor overcooking because these might cover the authentic taste of the foods. For example in Shunde, fish is often cooked through steaming and served only with soy sauce. Some might think steaming is not sufficient enough to get rid of the fishy smell or otherwise overcook the fish; however chefs in Shunde have a way of steaming the fish with precise duration of time and control of temperature that takes out the fishy smell and cook the fish to the right degree. The steam fish, naturally, tastes fresh and tender and can definitely represent Shunde cuisine. Even though it might seem easy to do, such technique requires years of experience and strict quality control of raw material. That being said, Shunde cuisine has never been given so much attention until the documentary “A Bite of Shunde”, a spin-off and sequel of “A Bite of China”, came out in 2016. The three-episode documentary introduces Shunde cuisine as one of the most prominent culinary scene in Southern China and showcases both traditional and innovative dishes made by cooks in Shunde. The program was aired on CCTV documentary channel and make Shunde famous overnight. People started to visit Shunde on weekends and holidays just for the sake of foods. In 2018, over 4.5 million tourists traveled to Shunde and created more than 17.1 billion in tourism revenue. With no doubt, the documentary has brought enormous economical benefits to the small town and create thousands of new jobs in food industry. However it is worth noting that the culinary culture of Shunde might not necessarily benefit from it. With more and more tourists come to town, the restaurants have to adjust their dishes to cater to different customers. One of the methods they use is to put heavy seasonings on the foods to create strong scents and tastes so they can stimulate customers in attempt to retain significant memory of the dishes. Such cooking method deviate from the original purpose of preserving the original flavor of the foods and give up the spirit Shunde Cuisine. On the other hand, the restaurants that got promoted in the documentary became the hotspots for tourists and people need to queue for hours to get in. Such phenomenon has made restaurants less motivated to improve their quality as they do not have to worry about the customer flow while the culinary experience deteriorated for customers who are mainly tourists. If they are satisfied with the experience, they might never come back and worst of all, they might tell other people not to come because the foods are overrated. It is a dilemma that are faced by many regional foods and should be addressed to achieve healthy development of a culture.
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