Because steaming preserves the freshness and natural flavors of fish, most Chinese prefer to eat their fish steamed— particularly the city dwellers of Guangzhou and Shanghai. Fish for steaming are always bought live, which is why I buy my fish in Chinatown—where grass carp, striped bass, sea bass, and many other types are pulled still swimming from large tanks. To eat a perfectly steamed fish is to taste the sea or the pond. The grass carp, a freshwater fish also sometimes identified as buf