Being the largest and the most populous continent in the world, Asia is the mother of many cultures. Each culture is associated with an indigenous cuisine, thus making Asia home to a large variety of great cuisines.
All of the Asian countries including China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam and their ethnic cultures have their own cuisines. Though the East Asian and Southeast Asian cuisines are closely related, they all have their own differences.
According to the East Asian tradition, in China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia and Taiwan, mostly rice, noodles, mung beans, soy beans, seafood, mutton, bok choy, and tea are part of the staple diet. Except the Japanese cuisine, all other East Asian culinary methods make use of oils, fats and sauces in the preparation of dishes. Whereas the Southeast Asian cuisines (including Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam) give importance to strong aromatic components with flavors of citrus and herbs. So, lime, coriander (cilantro), and basil find place in their regular diet.
The Chinese use chopsticks to eat food, which is a 6000 years old tradition. Chopsticks can be defined as a pair of small, thin, tapered sticks which can be held together in one hand to pick the food from the plates and to eat. They are normally made of bamboo, plastic, wood, or stainless steel, and are held in the dominant hand, between the thumb and fingers while picking up the pieces of food.
First used by the Chinese, the culture of chopsticks later spread to other East Asian and Southeast Asian countries including Japan, Korea, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam. As an exception, the traditional Thai method doesn’t adhere to the use of chopsticks; instead they use spoon and fork or bare hands while eating.
East Asian Cuisine
Being originated in a very vast country, Chinese cuisine has different variations centered on different regions. The most remarkable ones are the Szechuan, Shandong, Jiangsu and Guangdong cuisines. These are all named after the regions where they were formed. Such variations happened because of factors like available resources, climate, geography, history, cooking techniques and lifestyle.
Chinese
Chinese dishes are marked by their color, smell and taste. They also insist on the meaning, shape and nutrition of the food as well. Drying, salting, pickling and fermentation are the basic preservation methods that the Chinese traditional regional culinary methods largely depend upon. Rice, wheat, noodles, and soybean products are part of the Chinese staple diet.
Japanese
The Japanese are known for their seasonal food habits. So, their staple food diets change according to the season and the availability of items. Seafood is very common in Japan. In fact, the Japanese is the largest consumers of sea food in the world. The seafood is present in two of the most famous Japanese dishes, viz. sushi and sashimi.
Korean
The Korean cuisine largely depends on meats, rice and vegetables. Sesame oil, soy sauce, salt, garlic, ginger, fermented bean paste called the Doenjang, pepper flakes, Gochujang which is a type of fermented red chili paste and Napa cabbage are part of their cuisine. Meat, especially beef, chicken and pork are used for preparing many dishes in Korea, either by grilling, by roasting or by braising with vegetables.
Southeast Asian Cuisine
Thai
The Thai cuisine has hit headlines when seven of its dishes were listed among the World's 50 Most Delicious Foods by CNN in 2011. The dishes are Tom Yam Goong, Pad Thai, Som Tam, Massaman Curry, Green Curry, Thai Fried Rice and Moo Nam Tok. The aromatic and spicy qualities are striking as far as the Thai dishes are concerned. They are known for their complexity which they attain by being prepared of opposite elements to result in a harmony of tastes.
Vietnamese
Similarly, the Vietnamese cuisine also has its own philosophical implications inspired from the Chinese tradition. They follow the Yin and Yang in their cuisine by balancing the opposite qualities to make a complementary effect. For this purpose, they make use of the ‘heating’ and ‘cooling’ properties of the ingredients. A cool or cold (duck meat, sea foods, etc.) ingredient is always blended with a hot or warm one (fish sauce, ginger, and so on) to balance the Ying and Yangin their cuisine.
