Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China

Fuchsia Dunlop, the first Westerner to train at the prestigious Sichuan Institute of Higher Cuisine, “has done more to explain real Chinese cooking to non-Chinese cooks than anyone” (Julia Moskin, New York Times). In Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper, Dunlop recalls 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.