Smoking

Smoking is popular all over China, where it is a flavoring process rather than a cooking method. Ingredients are generally precooked in one way or another—most frequently salt-pepper-cured and steamed—before they are smoked briefly over tea leaves, rice, and brown sugar to acquire a deep color and a special flavor. The ingredients are not limited to meats, fowls, and fish as in the Western cuisine—smoked eggs, pressed bean curd, liver, tripe, shrimp, ducks’ tongues and feet, and salt-pepper-boiled fresh soy beans are all well-known specialties of different regions. But the most prominent is fowl—and duck is especially delicious. See Salt-cured Duck in the poultry chapter for an excellent smoked variation.