Like accents, preference of regional food reflects one’s cultural identity. Regional food not only brings people who are away from home a sense of culinary nostalgia,which Swislocki argues as “the recollection or purposive evocation of another time and place through food”, but also constructs an imaginary ideal society. As a Cantonese person, white cut chicken (baiqieji) is always a prominent dish to evoke homesickness when I was in New York. Featuring freshness and simplicity, the authentic white cut chicken is made with freshly-killed Qingyuan chicken whose meat is remarkably firm-fleshed and juicy. Instead of boiled, the meat is repeatedly dipped in the boiling water until cooked. In this way, crisp chicken skin and bone with slight blood signal the best white cut chicken. Ultimately, the dish is served with ginger-and-scallion-fried sauce rather than condiments with heavy taste, which allows the gourmets to taste the original flavor of the meat.
white cut chicken
White cut chicken is regarded as one of the most classic dishes in the Cantonese cuisine for several reasons. First, Cantonese people believe that “a feast is incomplete without chicken” (wuji bucheng yan) and have the tradition of entertaining honored guests with good-quality chicken (liangji). Second, it takes lots of time and labor to make the dish, though the steps look seemingly easy. Also, it largely projects the most distinguishing characteristic of the Cantonese cuisine–presenting the original flavor of the ingredients, suggesting that the freshness of ingredients is extremely important.
In 2014, to prevent bird flu, the Guangzhou government decided to replace live chicken with frozen ones in wet markets (read here: http://www.chinanews.com/cj/2014/06-18/6293092.shtml). Both the mass and some officials from the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (zhengxie) strongly opposed the decision, claiming that the taste of frozen chicken was far worse and that would greatly transform the eating habit of Cantonese people. Like people from other regions in China, Cantonese not only “cook their dishes with ingredients produced in their own district”, but also “by their reluctance to eat the food of another region”, yet more significantly, they have great obsession with fresh food. I believe that it implies both people’s capacity to select the appropriate ingredients based on time and season and to some extent, the pride of their perfect living environment which constantly provide adequate seasonal ingredients in their cooking. Consuming frozen food in turn indicates a loss of their ability and pride.
Six years after the prohibition, live chicken never disappears from people’s daily life. Nowadays, many rural tourism restaurants (nongjiale canting)—operated in suburban farms where customers can interactive with farming facilities and nature—and underground restaurants(sifangcai)—located in the owners’ home where home-made dishes are offered and generally bypass local zoning regulations and sanitary standards—near the city of Guangzhou provide dishes made with freshly-killed chicken. These restaurants find favor with lots of urban residents and epicures from other regions. I assume that it is because their food invokes culinary nostalgia, shortly bringing customers back to the old days when people were able to purchase fresh ingredients from wet markets and do home cooking in relaxed pace. Although some customers may never differentiate the taste of meat made with freshly-killed chicken from the frozen one and such nostalgia is only a false sense of a way of idealized life that they never experience, “freshly-killed” has always been a popular selling point in those loosely-regulated restaurants. Nevertheless, in New York, or the whole US, despite that the number of Cantonese restaurants is huge, there are few really “authentic” Cantonese meat dishes, for most of the raw meat has been frozen for days before it arrives at the kitchen.
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