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liuzhou

liuzhou

Without wishing to dampen anyone's enthusiasm in resolving this problem, I suspect you are not going to get very far.

 

Despite my best efforts over many years, I have never found definitive translations for many ingredients. The nature of China and the Chinese languages means that almost every town has a different name for any one ingredient.

 

When I moved from Hunan to Guangxi in 1999, I discovered that the local restaurants didn't do any of the dishes I had carefully learned the names of, and nor did the market have the veg I wanted.

But I eventually found out that they did have the same dishes and ingredients. They just used totally different words. I now know five different ways to say "potato".

 

Prior to the 2008 Olympics, Beijing authorities published what they called "official translations" of many dishes. I have shown this to many local chefs and cooks and they don't even get the Chinese!

 

Fuchsia Dunlop's Sichuan book is particularly confusing because she often uses Sichuan dialect, but then renders it in traditional characters which Sichuan doesn't use.

 

liuzhou

liuzhou

Without wishing to dampen anyone's enthusiasm in resolving this problem, I suspect you are not going to get very far.

Despite my best efforts over many years, I have never found definitive translations for many ingredients. The nature of China and the Chinese languages means that almost every town has a different name for any one ingredient.

When I moved from Hunan to Guangxi in 1999, I discovered that the local restaurants didn't do any of the dishes I had carefully learned the names of, and nor did the market have the veg I wanted.

But I eventually found out that they did have the same dishes and ingredients. They just used totally different words. I now know five different ways to say "potato".

Prior to the 2008 Olympics, Beijing authorities published what they called "official translations" of many dishes. I have shown this to many local chefs and cooks and they don't even get the Chinese!

Fuchsia Dunlop's Sichuan book is particularly confusing because she often uses Sichuan dialect, but then renders it in traditional characters which Sichuan doesn't use.

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