The Cantonese cuisine is one of the four schools of Chinese cooking. It can be divided into Guangzhou style, Chaozhou style, and Haka style, with Guangzhou style as the representative.
The Guangzhou style is broad and rare in ingredients, exquisite in matching of ingredients, good at taking initiative after imitation and modifying according to the tastes of guests. The cuisine pays much attention to clearness, freshness, refreshment, smoothness, tenderness, and crispness and particular to smell and presentation. The styles are numerous and complete in flavoring.
The Guangzhou style cuisine incorporates the strong points of other schools and keeps on taking initiative, such as Beijing Spareribs, Deep fried Yellow Croaker, Saute Shrimp with Eel, which absorbs the characteristics of Beijing style: Beef on Sizzling Platter, Pork Balls with Hot Spicy Sauce, Sichuan Chicken Cubes, absorbing the characteristics of Sichuan style: Five Spots Fish, Dongpo Pork, and Wine blanched Shrimp, absorbing the characteristics of Zhejiang style: Great-grandfather Chicken, famous in South of the Five Ridges, drawing on the experiences of Anhui style: while the Pork Steak with Watermelon Sauce and Steak with Tomato Sauce are adopted from the western style.
Cantonese cuisine has three wonders: Braised Dog, Salt Baked Sparrow and Snake Soup
The dog selected for “Braised Dog” should have the following features: The head is like an anvil, the ears are like dried orange peel, the legs are like chopsticks and the tail is like a pepper. The dog is braised with dried orange peel, ginger, and straw grass, called “Three treasures of Guangdong”, and other flavorings, after modification, lettuce, purple medic, and garlic are added. If it is eaten with lemon leaves or sea purple medic, a sweet scent will assail the nostrils and it is really delicious. Salt Baked Sparrow means Salt baked Skewbald Sparrow. The meat of this kind of sparrow is very tender and the bone is small. The taste of this dish is delicious. Snake soup refers to “Dragon Fights with Tiger Soup”. The ingredients are cobra, serpentine, old cat, and young chicken. Because snake looks like dragon, cat looks like tiger, and chicken look like phoenix, this dish is also called “Dragon-Tiger-Phoenix Soup”.

Boiled Chicken
Boiled Chicken is a kind of typical Cantonese style cuisine made by boiling the chicken in water. It is characterized for the simple procedure, tenderness, and retains of the natural flavors and textures. The procedure is as follows: take a local chicken under 1kg; first clean it and then put it into sizzling water; wait for about 15 minutes, during this period take out the chicken twice; then cool it down in cold water; take out the chicken and let it dry; coat the surface of the chicken with cooked peanut oil. It is eaten with the mixture of ground ginger, scallion shreds, salted and cooked oil. Boiled chicken is very smooth, light, and delicious, The famous Boiled Chicken cooked by Ban Xi Restaurant won the “Golden Tripod” awarded by the Ministry of Commerce… Besides, Qing Ping Chicken is also one kind of Boiled Chicken.

Roasted Goose
Roasted Goose is a kind of traditional barbecued meat in Guangdong. It originated from Roasted Duck. The medium or small-size Black Brown Goose of Qingyuan is most suitable for this dish. First cut off wings and legs of the goose, take out the guts and then blow it up. Coat the whole goose with five-spice powder and sew it up. Pour boiling water over the goose, and dip it into cold water for a moment. Take out the goose, coat sugar on it, let it dry and then preserve in salt. Hang the goose in roast pan or above open fire, Keep on rolling while heating. Cut it into pieces, arrange on the plate and it can be served. The Crisp-skinned Roasted Goose in Guangzhou. The most famous are those of Yu JI Roasted Goose Restaurant and Shen Jing Roasted Goose of Changzhou Island, Huangpu District.

Sweet Baked Pork with Honey Juice
It’s a traditional dish. The process of making this dish is: firstly, prepare a piece of pork in half fat and half lean, then cut it into slices and put them into an earthenware. After that, pickle them with condiments for 45 minutes. String them together with baking rings and put them into the oven to heat for 30 minutes. Pour the syrup on the dish regularly and another 2 minutes heating will be enough. When serving, the pork is sweet outside and salty inside. The lean pork is crisp and the fat one sweet.

Bai Yun Sweet and Sour Pork Kidney
It is one of the classical dishes of Guangzhou. The procedure is as follows: Clean the pork kidney (foreleg) cut it into pieces and boil them thoroughly. Let them stay in the running spring water for one whole day. Then boil them with sugar, white vinegar, and salt. After boiling, let it cool down and wait for several hours before it can be served. Because the spring water is from Bai Yun Mountain, the dish is named Bai Yun Sweet and Sour Pork Kidney. This dish is sweet sour, fatty but no greasy, crisp-skinned. Your will never be tired of tasting it. While cooked, this dish is paid attention to its colors, flavors, taste and the presentation. If some herbs and red pepper shreds are added, it will be a delight to eyes and be tastier.

Assorted Fancy Dishes
This dish is necessary for the banquets of any scale, it is said that a nun in Hedong, Shanxi province created this dish. Mr. Deng, a chef introduced the dish into Guangzhou by the end of Qing Dynasty. The styles of Assorted Fancy Dishes have been improved after many years of innovation. The styles include cold dishes, hot dishes, deep-fired dishes, stewed dishes, grilled dishes and brewed dishes. In recent years there has emerged “Eight Scenes Banquet” named after the eight scenic spots of Guangzhou, such as Pigeon Between Two Bridges, Moon Shadow in the Lake, Red Water Chestnut, Crisp Oyster Of Pearl River. The scenery is depicted and the emotions are expressed in perfect harmony reflecting the charm of the culture of the south of Five Ridges.

Dining Overview

Eating is everyone’s favorite activity in Guangzhou. When it is time to eat here, the range and diversity of dishes will impress even the most expert Chinese food connoisseur.

Guangzhou dishes are among the most famous in China. This fame derives partly from the excellent resources and fertile land surrounding the area and partly from the scarcity of money in the city. Guangzhou is situated close to the sea and fresh sea food is readily available. The land here is also very fertile and a wide range of vegetables and fruits are grown. European influence in the area can also be seen and fruit such as lychee and Portuguese oranges are commonly served up-an effect of the areas proximity to Macau. However, the fact that this is a traditionally poor area has also contributed to the growth of a great local cuisine. In times of need, resources were pooled and ingenuity ruled the kitchen! As such, the visitor to Guangzhou today can still find an incredible range of dishes that use ingredients in an unusual but inspired way.

The best Cantonese restaurants in town feature both traditional dim sum feasts-a selection of steamed delicacies-and bigger dishes. A good place to try exquisite dim sum is the Banxi Restaurant. Dim sum is best eaten with lots of friends! Traditionally the dishes are served in small baskets and in groups of four. If you come with other people you get to try a bit of everything! For those seeking a more formal atmosphere, the Guangzhou Restaurant prepares wonderful palatial style banquets. The Beiyuan Restaurant and the Dasanyuan Restaurant are also nice places to introduce you to Cantonese food. Most restaurants in Guangzhou are open from morning through till midnight and they tend to be very good fun, lively and noisy places!

Guangzhou also has a few good European style restaurants scattered about the town including Kathleen’s. Most of these places are concentrated on Shamian Island. There are numerous cafes and bars here serving up adequate western style cuisine and the big hotels such as the White Swan also feature some nice international restaurants for those who need a break from Canton cuisine.