The Disappearing Flavor (Expanded Edition)

Immortal crane and divine pine needles, deep-fried chicken testicle cakes, gold coin chicken (which isn’t really chicken)... These dishes are probably not even eaten by our parents' generation, but they are important parts of our Cantonese culinary heritage. Cantonese cuisine seems to be crude and big in portion sizes, but it is actually profound, exquisite, and very specific on the ingredients and cooking techniques. Cantonese people "never get tired of delicacy, and never get tired of fineness". Top-notch Cantonese cuisine is complicated and delicate. Though it loooks unremarkable, it often takes a whole day to make, and the control of heat must be precise for the best results. Not even a single mistake is allowed for the optimal taste of each ingredient to come through. Hong Kong's Cantonese cuisine comes from Shunde, Guangzhou and other places. Encompassing masterful craftsmanship and ingenious improvements of later generations, it has transformed into a series of dishes that are beyond imagination. However, many of them have to be painstakingly made. With the increasingly rapid pace of society, these flavors are gradually disappearing, and they do not even exist in our memory. Cantonese cuisine is about the exquisite taste and meticulous craftsmanship. Food critic Agnes Chee Yan-wei has tasted the most exquisite dishes all through the years. She has also consulted many famous chefs to understand the origin of each dish. With this book, she documents these dishes, as well as the ingredients and cooking techniques commonly used in Cantonese cuisine, and interviews with many famous chefs, in order to trace the origin of the flavors that have disappeared or are about to disappear, leaving valuable records.