Chaozhou at the Table: Teochew Cooking and Gongfu Tea

The Chaoshan region lies on the coast in the east of Guangdong, around the cities of Chaozhou, Shantou and Jieyang. Its people, known abroad as Teochew, emigrated in great numbers to Southeast Asia, and their cooking is familiar in Bangkok, Singapore and Hong Kong. At home it remains one of the most distinctive regional cuisines of China, and it is inseparable from a way of making tea.

The cooking

Teochew cuisine values the freshness and quality of the ingredient above seasoning, and is known for its seafood and vegetarian dishes. It shares elements with the cooking of Fujian, to the north, and with Cantonese food. Cooks poach, steam and braise more than they fry, and use little oil.

Braised dishes. Goose, duck, pork and offal are simmered in a master stock of soy sauce and spices and served sliced. Braised lion-head goose and the platters of brined meats are emblems of the cuisine.

Beef hotpot. Chaoshan hotpot, in a mild broth, is built on beef cut by hand within hours of slaughter, and is the region’s best-known meal to visitors.

Seafood. Crab, prawns and blood clams are served cold or marinated, and the oyster omelette, with small oysters fried in batter until crisp at the edges, is a classic.

Rice porridge. Teochew congee is thin, with the grains loose in the water. It is eaten with an array of small salted and braised dishes, and is a usual late-night supper.

Noodles and soups. Rice noodle soups, and kway chap, broad rice sheets in a dark soy broth.

Each dish has its own dip. Shacha sauce, fish sauce and flavoured vinegars are the usual ones. A good kitchen is judged by its stock, kept simmering and replenished from day to day.

Gongfu tea

Gongfu tea means tea made with skill. It is a method of brewing, not a ceremony in the Japanese sense. Its roots lie in Fujian and the Chaoshan area, and Chaozhou is regarded as its home; by some accounts the drinking of tea in this style goes back to the Song dynasty, and it remains an important part of social etiquette in Chaoshan.

The equipment is small. A pot of unglazed Yixing clay, or a lidded bowl called a gaiwan, holds between 60 and 200 millilitres. There are three cups of matching size, a tray with a reservoir beneath to catch the water, and a kettle.

The pot is rinsed with hot water and filled generously with leaves. The first water is poured on and discarded at once. The following infusions are short, ten to fifteen seconds at first and a little longer each time, and are poured out into the cups, sometimes by way of a pitcher so that every cup has the same strength. The tea is an oolong. Fenghuang Dancong, from Phoenix Mountain near Chaozhou, is the best-known local tea, and Tieguanyin is also served. The same leaves are infused many times.

The host invites the guests to drink, and a guest receives the cup with both hands. In the Chaoshan region tea is served in this way before a meal and after it, in shops, offices and homes.

For travellers

Chaozhou and Shantou are reached by high-speed train from Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Xiamen. Two days allow for the old town of Chaozhou, several meals and an hour in a tea shop, where a visitor who shows interest is usually offered a seat and a cup. Autumn and winter are the most comfortable seasons.

Teochew restaurants are also found throughout Guangzhou and Hong Kong. For the Cantonese tea meal, see our guide to yum cha. For the tea plant at its source, see our article on the old tea forests of Jingmai Mountain.