Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper
Winner of the IACP Jane Grigson Award (2009) and the Kate Whiteman Award for Work on Food and Travel (2009). Shortlisted for the James Beard Writing and Literature Award
Buy on Amazon US | Buy on Amazon UK
The modern classic that redefined the travel food memoir, with a new foreword from Bee Wilson.
Fuchsia Dunlop was the first Westerner to train at the prestigious Sichuan Institute of Higher Cuisine. In Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper, she recalls her apprenticeship in the Sichuanese culinary arts and her rapturous encounters with China’s culinary riches, alongside her brushes with corruption, environmental degradation, and greed. The resulting memoir is a vibrant portrait of Chinese culinary culture, from the remote Gansu countryside to the enchanting old city of Yangzhou. The most talked-about travel narrative when it was published a decade ago, this reissue of Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper remains a thrilling adventure that you won’t be able to put down.
Selected reviews
‘Insightful, entertaining, scrupulously reported… and a swashbuckling memoir studded with recipes… a distinguished contribution to the literature of gastronomy’ Dawn Drzal, New York Times
‘Destined to become a classic of travel writing’ The Observer (UK)
‘I have read many foreigners’ accounts of Chinese food, and without doubt this [one] is the most lively, fascinating and accurate…. Fuchsia understands Chinese cuisine better than any other foreigner I know.’ Chen Xiaoqing, director of the television shows “Flavorful Origins,” “A Bite of China,” and “Once Upon a Bite”
‘An autobiographical food-and-travel classic.’—Publishers Weekly
‘Not just a smart memoir about cross-cultural eating but one of the most engaging books of any kind I’ve read in years’ O Magazine
‘[Dunlop] writes…with an outsider’s eye, an insider’s palate, and a lover’s affection.’ Chris Tan, Straits Times, Singapore
‘Marvellous and mesmerising’ The Daily Mail (UK)
4 Responses to “Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper”
[…] couple months ago I read Fuchsia Dunlop’s book Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper. It was an excellent read simply from a travel book standpoint (and you all know how I feel about […]
[…] be known as just Fuchsia or just Dunlop) is a Chinese food phenomenon. Author of the best-selling Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China, the book outlines her deep love for Chinese cookery which began as a student at Cambridge, […]
Out on the Kindle in the US – can’t wait to read it tonight!
sharks fin… this is one of popular book i have ever read..you won’t miss it