Shanghai Dining, Shanghai Cuisine & Foods

Shanghai cuisine, also known as Hu Cai, includes two styles--Benbang cuisine and Haipai cuisine. Benbang cuisine, literally meaning "local cuisine", is the traditional family style cuisine. Haipai cuisine, literally meaning "all-embracing cuisine" is derived from the cosmopolitan culture.

Benbang cuisine and Haipai cuisine have many things in common: First, they make great use of fresh meat, chicken, vegetables and especially various marine ingredients such as fish, shrimps and crabs. Secondly, Shanghai cuisine has a great number of signature dishes made from various seasonal ingredients. Thirdly, a wide range of cooking techniques have been adopted and include steaming, braising, stewing, stir-frying, quick-frying, deep-frying, boiling, marinating, smoking and roasting. Fourthly, strongly hot food hardly ever forms part of Shanghai cuisine. Most of the dishes taste fresh, clear, mellow, sweet or subtly spicy.

In recent years, Shanghai cuisine has been greatly influenced by Cantonese cuisine. Consequently the dishes are now less oily and more delicate with the use of more high quality and expensive ingredients. People here have become more concerned about a healthy diet. This means there is an upsurge in the trend towards the use of fresh ingredients and in particular good quality fruit and vegetables.

Featured Shanghai Cuisine
When you come to Shanghai, do not miss the chance to go to famous Shanghai cuisine restaurants and try the signature Shanghai dishes.

Xiao Long Bao (Soup Dumplings)
shanghai xiao long bao When you are in Shanghai, one of the first things that you don't want to miss is Xiao Long Bao or soup dumplings (as they are commonly known in English). They are basically pork dumplings with hot broth inside them. There is skill concerning how to best savor the juicy broth so it bursts into your mouth, not all over you! First of all, you have to pick up the delicate dumpling with a pair of chopsticks, then you dip it into the rice vinegar with young shredded ginger, then you nibble the dumpling skin, sip the broth, and then eat it. It's quite complicated, but the broth really is the essence of Xiao Long Bao. The best of these soup dumplings are certainly Xie Fen Xiao Long Bao which are filled with crab meat / roe and minced pork, and the broth tastes even better with the tint of the crab meat / roe.

Da Zha Xie (Shanghai Hairy Crab)
Facing the East China Sea, Shanghai is famous for its seafood. In addition, due to its location among the rivers, lakes, and canals of the Yangtze Delta, locals favor freshwater produce just as much as saltwater products like crabs, oysters, and seaweed. The most famous local delicacy is Shanghai hairy crab.

The Hairy Crab is not the typical crab to go for the meat. It is small and hence it has little meaty portions. The roe and the inward, featuring a splendid sweet flavor, are what people go for.

The best and easiest way to cook crab is to simply steam them for 15 minutes with source made of soy bean sauce, vinegar, sugar and minced ginger. It is better to try crabs when they are hot, and two to four crabs are a proper amount for one person.

Shengjian and Guotie (Fried Steamed Bread and Fried Dumplings)
"Shengjian", fried steamed bread and "Guotie", fried dumplings are two of Shanghai's most famous exports. These foods can be found throughout China, and across the globe. These two dishes can be found at almost every breakfast table in Shanghai. Two of Shanghai's most popular Shengjian restaurants are the Fengyu Shengjian Restaurant, and the Xiaoyang Shengjian Restaurant. These restaurants are so popular that they usually have lines of people outside waiting to place an order.

Ba Bao La Jiang (Vegetable and Meat with Chili Sauce)
da bao la jiang Ba Bao La Jiang is typical among the few spicy dishes in Shanghai cuisine. It is a dish featuring great flavor and bright color. Bean sauce and chili sauce are blended and stir-fried with shelled shrimps, chicken, chicken stock, pork, dried shrimps, bamboo shoots and various kinds of seasoning. This dish with such a great number of ingredients gives us some idea of how delicate Shanghai cuisine can be.