A captivating journey spanning five thousand years of Chinese culinary heritage, exploring the essence of each era through seven extraordinary meals.   China in Seven Banquets takes readers on a gastronomic adventure into the history of China’s constantly evolving and astonishingly diverse cuisine. From the opulent Eight Treasures feast of ancient times to the Tang dynasty’s legendary “Tail-Burning” banquet, and the extravagant “complete Manchu-Han feast” of the Qing court, these iconic repasts offer glimpses into China’s rich food history. Delving further, the book invites us to partake of lavish banquets immortalized in literature and film, a New Year’s buffet from 1920s Shanghai, a modern delivery menu reflecting the hyperglobal present, and it even offers a peek at the tables of the not-so-distant future. Drawing upon his extensive gastronomic adventures across China, acclaimed historian Thomas David DuBois unravels its ever-changing landscape of culinary trends, revealing why flavors and customs evolved over time. DuBois also recreates dozens of traditional recipes using modern kitchen techniques. Whether indulging in fermented elk or savoring absinthe cocktails, readers embark on an unparalleled odyssey that redefines their perception of Chinese cuisine. " China in Seven Banquets is in part a condensed account of Chinese foodways from antiquity to the present, using descriptions of dishes from the menus of actual, fictional and conjectural banquets to illustrate crucial moments in Chinese history. But at least as importantly, it is also an account of how China’s cultural identity has been progressively shaped and reshaped by encounters with non-Chinese geopolitical realities over some four millennia. . . . The latter part of the book, which examines the past 150 or so years of Chinese socioeconomic history through the lens of food, [is] . . . energized, focused, incisive." ― Wall Street Journal "DuBois roots his account in the long-term historical forces that have shaped Chinese society, with special attention devoted to the impact of money and technology on modern China’s relationship with food. . . . What he successfully captures are the many ways in which food in China serves as the backdrop to other social, cultural, and political pursuits—perhaps the defining quality of the Chinese relationship with food." ― Los Angeles Review of Books "A magic-lantern show of richly animated dining scenes through the ages. . . . DuBois has written a genuinely original contribution to Chinese food studies in the present era—one that has all the formal accoutrements but none of the sterility of an academic work. It deserves to be read not just for its selective excursions into the history of one of world gastronomy’s most dynamic provinces, but for its reflections on the changing nature of our engagement with food and its political economy, wherever we happen to be." ― World of Fine Wine "A ‘flavorful history’ of 500 years of Chinese cuisine via seven storied dinners. Food historian DuBois shares his findings from decades of travelling around China, revealing the country’s culinary character through meals including the ‘tail-burning’ banquet of the Tang dynasty, plus insights into food featured in Chinese literature and film, a New Year’s buffet from 1920s Shanghai and a twenty-first-century delivery menu." ― National Geographic Traveler "An energetic survey of Chinese culinary history. Ranging from the country’s prehistoric agricultural systems to Western influences on twenty-first-century cuisine, DuBuois uses seven banquets to highlight the foods and cultural attitudes that defined different eras of Chinese history. . . . Throughout, DuBois debunks the idea that there is one 'traditional' Chinese cuisine, explaining how ingredients, dishes, and techniques evolved as a result of imperial expansion, globalization, and industrialization. . . . The detailed recipes and chatty tone make this an accessible overview of Chinese cuisine. Readers will be satisfied." ― Publishers Weekly "[An] accessible, riveting history of Chinese food." ― Spectator "DuBois’s deceptively chatty introduction to China in Seven Banquets artfully digests a bunch of important food-studies concepts for the general reader, including the nature of sources, the metadata of meals, and precedents in the study of foodways. . . . With only seven meals to distil the 5000-year span of Chinese history, DuBois takes what I suspect to be a tutorial delight in using different research methods." -- Jonathan Clements ― The Distracted Diner " China in Seven Banquets is a fascinating book. DuBois promises to provide scholarly insights without the dry prose or interminable footnotes that might stop you from turning to the next page. He succeeds very well in balancing depth and accessibility. . . . The text is liberally seasoned with recipes, which give a sense of not just what was prepared, but how, and with what ingredients. . .