Peking duck heads the list of popular Chinese dishes, with Kung Pao chicken, mapo tofu, sweet and sour pork, dumplings and hot pot. Chinese food in China is far more varied than the takeaway menus most travelers know, with eight major regional cuisines and thousands of local specialties. This list of 15 tasty Chinese dishes will help you order with confidence on a trip to China.
The eight great cuisines of Chinese food
Chinese cooking is traditionally divided into eight regional cuisines: Sichuan, Cantonese, Shandong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Hunan and Anhui. Each has its own flavors and techniques.
Sichuan and Hunan food is hot and bold. Cantonese cooking from Guangdong favors fresh ingredients and light sauces. Jiangsu and Zhejiang dishes from the Yangtze delta are slightly sweet and delicate. Shandong food from the north is salty and crisp, and it shaped the imperial cooking of Beijing. Knowing which region a dish comes from tells you a lot about how it will taste.
The other four are less familiar abroad. Fujian cooking from the south-east coast is built on seafood, clear soups and red fermented rice wine lees; its showpiece, Buddha Jumps Over the Wall, is a slow-cooked soup of dozens of luxury ingredients. Anhui food, from the mountains around Huangshan, uses wild herbs, bamboo shoots and mushrooms, and is known for stewing and for its "smelly" fermented mandarin fish. Zhejiang dishes include West Lake vinegar fish and Longjing shrimp cooked with green tea, while Jiangsu, home of Huaiyang cuisine, prizes precise knife work, as in da zhu gan si, dried tofu cut into hair-thin shreds and simmered in stock.
The eight-cuisine system is a traditional classification, not a complete map. Many travellers' favourite food comes from regions outside it, such as the halal lamb and noodles of the north-west, the dumplings and stews of the north-east, and the sour, herb-heavy cooking of Yunnan and Guizhou. Use the list as a starting point, then order what each city is proud of.
15 most popular Chinese dishes to try
Menus across China feature these dishes more than any others, and locals and visitors love them alike.
1. Peking duck
Beijing's famous roast duck has thin, crisp, shiny skin. It is carved at the table and wrapped in thin pancakes with spring onion, cucumber and sweet bean sauce. Book a well-known duck restaurant in Beijing to try it at its best.
Beijing has two roasting styles. The hung-oven method, linked to Quanjude, hangs the duck in an open brick oven over a fruitwood fire, which gives a smoky, glossy skin. The closed-oven method, used by Bianyifang, cooks the bird with heat radiating from the oven walls and produces a softer, juicier result. Many diners try both. The first slices served are usually pure skin, which is traditionally dipped in sugar, and many restaurants offer the leftover carcass as a soup afterwards. One duck feeds two to four people with other dishes, and half ducks are often available. Order it at the start of the meal, as roasting takes time and popular places sell out on weekend evenings.
2. Kung Pao chicken
A Sichuan stir-fry of diced chicken, peanuts, dried chilies and Sichuan peppercorns in a sweet, sour and slightly numbing sauce. The version in China is spicier than most overseas copies.
In Chinese it is gong bao ji ding. The name is generally traced to Ding Baozhen, a late Qing dynasty governor of Sichuan whose official title was Gongbao, or Palace Guardian. A good version balances several tastes at once: the vinegar and sugar in the sauce, the toast of the peanuts, the smoky dried chillies, which are there for aroma and are left on the plate, and the light tingle of Sichuan peppercorn. The chicken is cut into small cubes so it cooks in seconds over a very hot wok. Outside Sichuan, especially in the north, restaurants often tone down the heat and add vegetables such as cucumber or carrot. Travellers new to spice can order this Sichuan dish safely, and it pairs well with plain steamed rice.
3. Mapo tofu
Born in Chengdu, mapo tofu is soft tofu cooked with fermented black beans in a fiery red sauce of chili bean paste, minced beef or pork and ground Sichuan pepper. It is eaten with plain rice to balance the heat.
The name means roughly "pockmarked old woman's tofu", after the cook traditionally credited with the dish, whose name lives on in Chengdu's Chen Mapo restaurant. Chinese cooks describe a good mapo tofu with a set of words: ma (numbing), la (hot), tang (very hot in temperature), xian (savoury), nen (tender) and su (crisp, from the meat). The tofu is soft and silky, so eat it with a spoon over rice. The chilli bean paste at its heart, doubanjiang, comes from Pixian, a district of Chengdu famous for the paste. Overseas versions are often thickened and mild; in Sichuan it arrives covered in red oil. Vegetarians can ask for it without meat, though the result still uses animal fat in some kitchens.
4. Sweet and sour pork
Crisp fried pork pieces coated in a bright sweet and sour sauce. Cantonese restaurants make the version known worldwide, while the northeast has its own crunchier style called guo bao rou.
The Cantonese dish, gu lao rou, uses pork shoulder or loin dipped in batter, fried twice and tossed with a sauce of vinegar, sugar and, in many places, pineapple and peppers. Its tomato-red colour comes from ketchup in many modern kitchens, a touch the original did not need. Guo bao rou, from Harbin in the north-east, uses large thin slices of pork in a potato-starch batter fried until glassy and very crisp, then coated in a pale, sharper sauce of vinegar, sugar and ginger. It is best eaten immediately, before the coating softens. A third relative, sweet and sour ribs from Shanghai and Wuxi, is served cold as a starter. Children and visitors who do not eat spicy food usually find all three versions easy to enjoy.
5. Jiaozi (dumplings)
Crescent-shaped dumplings filled with pork, cabbage, chives or shrimp. They are boiled, steamed or pan-fried, and families make them together at Chinese New Year in northern China.
The crescent shape is said to resemble old silver ingots, which is why dumplings at New Year symbolise wealth. In the north they are a staple meal: dumpling restaurants sell them by weight, usually by the liang, with one liang typically meaning a small plate of several dumplings; ask the server how many are in a portion. Boiled dumplings (shui jiao) are dipped in black vinegar, soy sauce and chilli oil, while pan-fried potstickers (guo tie) have a crisp base. Fillings go far beyond pork and cabbage: lamb with carrot, egg with chive, fish in coastal cities and mixed vegetable for vegetarians. In winter, a bowl of the dumpling cooking water is sometimes served at the end of the meal to aid digestion.
6. Xiaolongbao
Shanghai's soup dumplings hold hot broth and pork inside thin pleated wrappers. Bite a small hole, sip the soup, then dip the dumpling in black vinegar with ginger.
The soup comes from a jellied pork stock folded into the filling, which melts as the dumplings steam. Xiaolongbao means "small basket buns", after the bamboo steamers they are cooked and served in, usually around eight to ten to a basket. Their home is Nanxiang, on the north-western edge of Shanghai, where the style dates back to the 19th century. Besides plain pork, look for versions with crab roe or crab meat, a seasonal favourite in autumn. Good xiaolongbao have thin but unbroken skins; if they stick to the steamer and tear, the soup is lost. They are often confused with shengjian bao, Shanghai's pan-fried soup buns with a thicker, bready dough and a crisp base, which are worth ordering on the same trip.
7. Hot pot
A pot of simmering broth sits in the middle of the table and diners cook thin meat, tofu, mushrooms and vegetables in it. Chongqing and Chengdu are famous for spicy hot pot full of chili oil and peppercorns.
Ordering works like a tick-box menu: first choose the broth, then the items to cook, then make your own dipping sauce at a sauce bar. Chongqing-style hot pot uses a beef-tallow base and is the most intense; Chengdu versions are often made with vegetable oil and slightly lighter. Northern China has a gentler style, Beijing's copper-pot lamb hot pot, where thin slices of mutton are swished in clear broth and dipped in sesame sauce. Classic items include beef tripe, duck intestines, thin lamb or beef slices, tofu skin, lotus root, potato and leafy greens. Each piece cooks in seconds to a few minutes, so add a few at a time. Hot pot suits groups and long evenings; it is less practical for a solo diner, though some chains offer individual pots.
8. Chow mein
Stir-fried noodles with vegetables and meat, cooked fast over high heat. You will find versions in almost every Chinese city.
The name is chao mian, literally "fried noodles", and versions differ widely. In Guangdong and Hong Kong, the best-known style is soy sauce fried noodles, thin egg noodles tossed with bean sprouts and spring onion, a popular breakfast at dim sum restaurants. Another Cantonese style fries the noodles into a crisp nest and pours a thick sauce of seafood or meat over the top. In the north, wheat noodles are thicker and often fried with cabbage, pork and dark soy. Chow mein as served in many Western countries, with very soft noodles and a sweet sauce, is a local adaptation and is rarely seen in China. If you want a stir-fried noodle dish in a restaurant without an English menu, "chao mian" plus the main ingredient, such as beef (niurou) or egg (jidan), is usually understood.
9. Dim sum
A Cantonese tradition of small dishes eaten with tea in the morning or at lunch. Har gow (shrimp dumplings), siu mai, char siu buns and rice noodle rolls are favorites. Guangzhou and Hong Kong are the best places to try it.
In Cantonese, going for dim sum is called yum cha, "drinking tea", and the tea is part of the ritual. When you sit down, choose a tea such as pu'er, jasmine or oolong; a small tea charge per person is normal. Tap the table with two or three fingers to thank someone who refills your cup, and leave the teapot lid ajar when you want more hot water. Many teahouses have replaced trolleys with order sheets: tick the dishes and quantities, and the staff stamp a card as dishes arrive. Go early: the most popular teahouses are busiest at weekend mornings, and some dishes sell out. Vegetarian choices are limited, but turnip cake, steamed vegetable dumplings and egg tarts are common.
10. Char siu
Cantonese barbecued pork glazed with honey and soy, roasted until red at the edges. It is sold by weight at roast meat shops and served over rice.
Char siu means "fork roast", after the long forks once used to roast the meat over an open fire. The best cut is pork shoulder or neck with a little fat, which keeps it moist. The marinade usually combines honey or maltose, soy sauce, hoisin, five-spice and rice wine, and the red edge comes from red fermented tofu or, in cheaper versions, food colouring. Look for shops with the meat hanging in the window and a queue at lunchtime. Order it over rice, or as a "two-roast" plate with roast duck or crispy pork belly. The same meat fills char siu bao, the fluffy steamed buns of dim sum, and it is often sliced into wonton noodle soup in Hong Kong.
11. Spring rolls
Thin pastry rolls filled with vegetables or meat and fried until crisp. They are traditionally eaten around the Spring Festival.
In Chinese they are chun juan, literally "spring rolls", a name that comes from that seasonal custom of eating fresh spring vegetables at the start of the lunar year. The rolls served in Cantonese restaurants and dim sum houses are thin, crisp and filled with pork, shrimp, mushroom and bamboo shoot. In Fujian and Taiwan, the run piaa is a different thing altogether: a soft, fresh wrapper rolled at the table around a mix of vegetables, peanuts, egg and meat, and not fried at all. Fried rolls are best eaten hot, with a little vinegar or chilli sauce. In much of China they are a side dish or snack, so order them alongside other dishes.
12. Wonton soup
Small dumplings with thin wrappers served in clear broth. Cantonese wonton noodles add thin egg noodles to the bowl.
Wontons go by different names across China: huntun in Mandarin, chaoshou in Sichuan and bianrou in Fujian, and each region has its own style. In Hong Kong and Guangzhou, wontons are filled with shrimp and pork, and the noodles are cooked springy and served with the dumplings hidden underneath so they do not get soggy. Shanghai's large wontons are packed with pork and greens and served in a light broth. Sichuan's red oil wontons (hongyou chaoshou) skip the soup altogether and are dressed with chilli oil, garlic and a little sugar. A bowl of wonton soup is one of the cheapest and fastest meals in a Chinese city, and small shops serving it open early, which makes it a good breakfast option.
13. Fried rice
Yangzhou fried rice, with egg, shrimp, ham and peas, is the classic version. It is a simple dish that shows a cook's skill with the wok.
The best fried rice uses rice cooked the day before, which is drier and separates into individual grains. Chinese cooks talk about wok hei, the "breath of the wok", the slightly smoky flavour that comes from very high heat and constant tossing; it is the difference between restaurant fried rice and the home-cooked kind. Yangzhou fried rice is lighter in colour than many overseas versions, since it is seasoned mainly with salt and stock and only a little soy sauce. Other styles include Cantonese salted fish and chicken fried rice, and pineapple fried rice in the south. Fried rice often comes at the end of a banquet, and it makes an easy, mild order for children or anyone unsure about spice.
14. Dongpo pork
A Hangzhou specialty of thick pork belly braised slowly in soy sauce and rice wine until it melts in the mouth. It is named after the Song dynasty poet Su Dongpo.
Su Dongpo (1037 to 1101), also known as Su Shi, was a poet, painter and official who served in Hangzhou and is remembered there for building the Su Causeway across West Lake. Local tradition credits him with this way of cooking pork, slow and with little water, and he wrote a short poem in praise of braised pork. The dish is served as a square block of belly, with layers of fat and lean, often tied with string and cooked in a clay pot until a chopstick slides straight through. The sauce is sweet and savoury from Shaoxing rice wine, soy and rock sugar. It is rich, so one piece per person, with rice and a green vegetable, is usually enough.
15. Zhajiangmian
Thick wheat noodles topped with a sauce of fried fermented soybean paste and minced pork, served with shredded cucumber. The dish has its roots in Shandong, but Beijing made it famous, and old noodle houses in the capital still serve it the classic way.
The name means "fried sauce noodles". The sauce, made from yellow soybean paste and sweet bean sauce fried slowly with diced pork belly, is salty and deeply savoury, not sweet, and only a spoonful goes on each bowl. In traditional Beijing noodle houses, the noodles arrive with a set of small toppings, called cai ma, such as shredded cucumber, radish, bean sprouts, celery and soybeans, which you mix in yourself. Eat it with a clove of raw garlic, as many locals do. Korean jajangmyeon descends from it but uses a darker, sweeter black bean sauce, so the two taste quite different. It is an affordable, filling lunch and a good counterpoint to the richer duck banquets of the capital.
Spicy Chinese food: Sichuan and Hunan dishes
If you love heat, head to Sichuan and Hunan provinces. Sichuan food is known for the numbing and spicy flavor called mala, created by chili and Sichuan peppercorn together.
In Chengdu, try dan dan noodles, fish cooked in chili oil (shui zhu yu) and twice-cooked pork. Hunan food from Changsha is hot without the numbing effect, using fresh and pickled chilies. Steamed fish head with chopped chilies is a Hunan classic. Ask for "wei la" if you want mild spice.
Useful phrases help at the table. "Wei la" means slightly hot, "zhong la" medium and "te la" extra hot, while "bu yao la" means no chilli at all, although some Sichuan dishes cannot really be made without it. Other dishes worth knowing include spicy boiled beef (shui zhu niu rou), fish-fragrant aubergine (yu xiang qie zi), which contains no fish despite its name, and dry-fried green beans for a milder side. In Hunan, look for Chairman Mao's red-braised pork, a sweet and spicy pork belly from his home province, and stir-fried pork with green chillies (xiao chao rou), one of the most common home-style dishes in Changsha.
Peppercorn heat builds over a meal, and plain rice, cold cucumber salad and soy milk or sweet drinks help more than water. If you have a sensitive stomach, introduce spicy food over a few days and leave hot pot until later in the trip.
Chinese street food and snacks
Street food in China is cheap and lively, and night markets are a good place to sample many small things in one evening.
Jianbing, a crepe with egg, crisp cracker, sauce and herbs, is a popular breakfast in Beijing and Tianjin. Roujiamo, sometimes called the Chinese hamburger, is shredded braised meat in flatbread from Xi'an. Xi'an's Muslim Quarter is also known for lamb skewers, biangbiang noodles and yangrou paomo, a lamb soup with torn bread. Stinky tofu, deep-fried fermented tofu, is popular in Changsha and Taiwan, with a strong smell and mild taste.
A few more names to look for: Shanghai's shengjian bao, crisp-bottomed pork buns cooked in large flat pans; Guangzhou's cheung fun, rice noodle rolls steamed to order at street stalls; and chuan'r, the cumin-dusted lamb skewers of the north and west, grilled late into the night. In winter, roasted sweet potatoes and candied hawthorn skewers (tanghulu) appear on Beijing's streets.
Choosing a stall is simple: pick one with a queue of locals and a fast turnover, so food is cooked fresh. Most vendors take mobile payments through Alipay or WeChat Pay, both of which can now be linked to many foreign cards, so set them up before travelling and carry some cash as a backup. Night markets usually start around dusk and run late, with the best choice on weekend evenings.
How to order and eat Chinese food in China
Chinese meals are shared. Everyone orders dishes for the table, and you eat a little of each with rice. A good rule is one dish per person plus one more.
Many restaurants have picture menus, and city restaurants increasingly use QR code ordering on phones. Hot tea or hot water is served with meals more often than cold drinks. Do not stick your chopsticks upright in a bowl of rice, as this is linked with funeral offerings. Tipping is not expected in most of mainland China.
A few more habits make meals easier. Dishes arrive as soon as they are cooked, not in courses, and rice often comes last unless you ask for it with the meal. To call a server, say "fuwuyuan" or simply raise your hand; staff do not usually check on tables. At a shared meal, the host often orders and pays, and it is polite to offer to pay while expecting to be refused. Use the serving spoon or the back of your chopsticks for shared dishes when one is provided. Portions are designed for sharing, so a solo traveller does best with noodle shops, dumpling houses and set lunch places.
For a food trip, compare flights to China and hotels in Beijing, Chengdu, Xi'an and Guangzhou. Entry rules depend on your passport, as China now lets some nationalities visit visa-free for short stays. Our China visa guide covers the basics, and the Chinese embassy in your country confirms what applies to you.
Where to eat each dish in China: a city-by-city guide
Nearly all of the 15 dishes above taste best in the city or province they come from. If you are planning a food-focused route, these are the places to order them.
| City | Dishes to try there | Where to look |
|---|---|---|
| Beijing | Peking duck, zhajiangmian, jiaozi, jianbing | Quanjude, founded in 1864, still roasts duck at its flagship on Qianmen Street; old noodle houses for zhajiangmian; street stalls for a jianbing breakfast |
| Shanghai | Xiaolongbao | The dumplings come from Nanxiang, now part of Shanghai's Jiading District, and the Nanxiang Bun Shop draws long queues in the city |
| Chengdu | Mapo tofu, Kung Pao chicken, dan dan noodles, twice-cooked pork, hot pot | Chen Mapo, the restaurant linked to the dish since the 19th century; neighbourhood Sichuan restaurants for everything else |
| Chongqing | Spicy hot pot | Local hot pot halls; ask for a split "yuanyang" pot if you want one mild broth beside the chilli one |
| Guangzhou and Hong Kong | Dim sum, char siu, wonton noodles, sweet and sour pork | Teahouses for morning dim sum; roast meat shops for char siu over rice |
| Hangzhou | Dongpo pork | Lou Wai Lou on Gushan island in West Lake, a restaurant dating from 1848, serves Dongpo pork and West Lake vinegar fish |
| Yangzhou | Yangzhou fried rice | Local restaurants in its home city, an easy side trip from Nanjing |
| Xi'an | Roujiamo, biangbiang noodles, yangrou paomo | The Muslim Quarter's food streets, where most stalls are halal |
If you can only visit one city, Chengdu covers the most dishes from this list in one place, and Guangzhou is the best choice for a gentler, less spicy food trip.
Planning a trip to China? Read our China travel guide, compare hotels in China or search flights.
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