liuzhou

Yes. Very popular. Every supermarket and corner store has it. There are also a huge number of competitors in the hot sauce aisles.

Largely, yes. Also for hot pots.

I can assure that it is very much a myth! 99.9% of Chinese people do not use them.

I can assure you none of them are Teflon.

Well, my ocular talents are on a level with yours. One day I'll go back and check, but it's not a part of town I normally frequent. Most people, in my experience, do use the long handled style. Both my woks are so designed. It tends to be called the Beijing style. I forget what the other kind with two loops is called - the impractical kind?

The red handled things aren't woks. I forget what they are but not woks.

No! None are non-stick! Dreadful idea! Just different metals.

The woks I mentioned in this photograph are hand made with a hammer.

Actually, you can. I have done so, just not stir-fried. As I said, you can cook almost anything in it. 95% of the lunches and dinners I post here are wok-cooked. Chinese, Italian, Middle-Eastern, British, French, Indian, Greek et al.

Something regarding wild or controversial meats which I meant to mention, then forgot: If you plan to visit China anytime, do not worry about accidentally ordering or being served something you'd never knowingly eat. Wild food, due to its legal status, is wildly expensive (pun intended). No one is going to serve you it as a cruel joke. Dog, cat, horse and donkey restaurants proudly display the animals they are selling either in cages or in pictures. Adjacent horse meat restaurants in Guilin, China

Indeed. Nearly everyone in China's cities lives in apartment blocks and don't have backyards. In the countryside, they don't have gas! No one is going to install a high BTU burner in an apartment kitchen even if they were allowed to.

I had a whole doe sent me by Mr. Hozier, which is a fine present, and I had the umbles of it for dinner. Samuel Pepys - 1667

10. You need a wok and high BTU burner to cook Chinese food. I've muttered and mumbled about this issue several times before elsewhere on this site, but it really belongs here, so... First, you need neither, although a wok (炒锅 - chǎo guō, literally 'fry pot', usually shortened to just 锅 - guō) is a very useful and versatile tool in the kitchen. Ideal for stir frying, deep frying, boiling, steaming, smoking etc. In many Chinese homes, the wok may well be the only utensil available. I use one in 95% of my cooking. Clay pot 沙锅 That said, not all Chinese dishes use woks. Clay pots (沙锅 - shā guō) are often used as are pressure cookers, rice cookers and these hot pot dishes. Stir fries can be done in regular frying pans/skillets, but woks are better. Their high sides enable better, more thorough stirring. Wok Burners There are those who will tell you that you can't use a wok successfuly on a regular stove. That will come as a shock to the millions of people across China cooking lunch right now in their woks using regular stoves. I have never seen anyone anywhere in China using a high-temperature wok burner outside of a restaurant. "But you won't get the 'wok hei' without a high temperature," they complain. Well, here's a secret. Few people care. Few people even know what 'wok hei' is. The expression 'wok hei' (鑊氣) is Cantonese, a language spoken by around 70 million people (most of whom are not even in China), whereas Putonghua (in English, Mandarin) is spoken by around a billion! So, it is really only important in Cantonese cooking. Even in Cantonese speaking areas, people don't use special wok burners domestically. Elsewhere, restaurants use high temperature cooking for stir fries as it is much quicker - obviously desirable in a busy restaurant or canteen. Until recently, I didn't even know where I could have bought a high BTU burner in this city, but found one shop in an area selling industrial equipment to business and restaurants etc.. If you want to emulate Cantonese restaurant food, then go ahead and get yourself one. Here, people just go to the restaurant or make do at home on their regular gas stoves.

Camembert and toast.

As I said before it the number of dog-meat eaters in China is extremely low, probably less than 0.1%. Given its population of over 1.4 billion, that figure is, of course, higher than anywhere else. If 140,000 Chinese people have itchy buttocks, that doesn't mean the Chinese are more prone to having itchy buttocks. It just shows there are a lot of Chinese people. Absolute figures are statistically meaningless. It has been stated that at last year's Yulin festival 1,000 dogs were eaten. Given that one dog serves around eight diners, that would represent approximately 0.0006% of the Chinese population. Hardly large scale.

对

I'd add that all over China, Hunan women, especially the younger ones are referred to as 湖南辣妹 - hú nán là mèi, literally Hunan Hot Sister, with hot here referring to their love of chillies, but also with the same innuendo as English has. I've also seen it translated as Hunan Spice Girls.

Back to dairy for a moment. Just took delivery of this. The joys of online shopping in China. French would be better, but this ain't bad.

Basically yes. Sichuan does use a lot of dried chillies, but not exclusively. Hunan also uses dried chillies but fresh are more prevalent. Both also use a lot of pickled chillies as does Guangxi.

9. Sichuan has China's spiciest food. While Sichuan is certainly not chilli-shy, a lot of its food looks spicier than it actually tastes. Take my favourite dish from the area - 辣子鸡 (là zi jī). A bright red dish of a mound of chillies (辣椒 - là jiāo) in which lie pieces of chicken (鸡肉 - jī ròu). As Fuchsia Dunlop points out here (with recipe) this originates from Chongqing, which is no longer part of Sichuan, but was until 1997. Despite its formidable appearance it isn't actually that spicy-hot. The chillies are not eaten, but cooking the chicken with the spice adds a more subtle spiciness. Chongqing and Sichuan are also famous for their hotpots, which are more spicy, but again not the spiciest food I have eaten. Chongqing Hot Pot Broths By far the most spicy food I've eaten anywhere in China (or the world) is from Western Hunan and Guizhou, the neighbouring province. Pig's Ear with green and red chillies - Hunan Duck with Chillies - Hunan The food here in Northern Guangxi can also be very hot and the markets and supermarkets all carry several varieties of chillies. and many more. You'll be glad the lack of dairy is a myth. See this topic for much more on Hunan.

I know that lactose intolerance is world wide, but as I said, the extent to which it applies to China is greatly exaggerated by some people in the media and online. The supermarkets wouldn't carry so many dairy products if no one bought them.

To clarify, commercial slaughter and sale of dog meat is illegal in Switzerland, but farmers are allowed to slaughter dogs for personal consumption. But that is kind of irrelevant. I guess it's not a regular thing here in China, too. In 25 years, I've only had it three times, I think. And I only used Switzerland as an example. I could have used many others. Some Native Americans eat it as do many countries across Africa and Asia. It was also eaten in many countries during the two World Wars when food was in short supply.

Not really. They just seem to attract similar clienteles. Yes. To help bash the cleaver through the tougher parts. I have one in my kitchen, but never used it on alligator.

to sum up Eating certain animals will attact penalties ranging from having your leftovers confiscated (the police will take them home and eat them) to life imprisonment for killing and eating a tiger. Eating a panda will get you the death penalty. It has happened. Also a lot of the myths are caused by visitors misunderstanding what they see, by the media and by racists setting out to denigrate. One visitor a few years back wandered away from me and saw a stall set out with dead rats. She rushed back and said, "How disgusting! They eat rats". The stall was selling rat poison and the dead rodents were beng used as testimony to the poison's efficiency. The rats were not for sale. She still went home and told the tale the way she saw it. I think that's it. I'm off to eat a nice stewed Sichuan style braised rabbit head.