Sino-French food fusion

To mark 50 years of diplomatic ties between China and France, the French Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry held a China-France Culinary Culture Seminar in Beijing earlier this week.

The seminar was attended by delegates from about 100 leading food and beverage producers. The companies were acknowledged for their efforts to promote Sino-French relations over the years.

Leading cultural and culinary specialists, including Carole LY, agriculture counselor at the French embassy in Beijing and Dong Zhenxiang, founder of Da Dong Peking Roast Duck Restaurant, also shared their views on dining culture and culinary values in their two countries.

Loic Bienassis, an historian at the European Institute of the History and Culture of Food in the French city of Tours, said: "French best-quality ingredients are usually associated with their regional origins. For example, black truffle from Perigord."

Dong said Chinese cuisines in the future will develop further and find greater acceptance globally, with more people learning to cook them.

The conference ended with chefs from the two countries presenting a lively cooking show, displaying fusion through cuisines.

Xu Bo, a culinary expert from Da Dong Yijing Cuisine, a company that owns the famous Da Dong Roast Duck Restaurant, showed how to use Chinese hawthorn fruits to make a madeleine, a traditional small cake from Commercy and Liverdun in northeastern France.

Stephane Laurens, a chef at Brasserie FLO Beijing, a renowned French restaurant, also showed how to use French black truffles to make a Chinese dessert of lotus seeds and roots with the help of sugar soup.