Herbal cuisine, which combines the properties of food and medicine, 　　is becoming more popular, but its future depends on customer education
　　and regulations to insure safety
　　
　　INTRICATE DELICACY: Wang Youhong, the head chef of an herbal cuisine restaurant, prepares a soup dish for customers
　　
　　Wang Youhong"s life has been in a whirl ever since the restaurant where he is the head chef opened six months ago. Wang, 34, works in a restaurant in northern Beijing that specializes in herbal cuisine. Every day he is busy showing visiting chefs around as well as having discussions with people interested in partnering with the restaurant.
　　Despite the remote location of the restaurant, business is buoyant. Its customers include many foreigners who have been attracted to the restaurant by word of mouth.
　　According to Wang, herbal cuisine brings in revenue of over 400,000 yuan every month, which is the envy of restaurants of a similar scale.
　　“China’s herbal cuisine industry faces a good opportunity for development,” said Wang. “I believe in 10 years China’s herbal cuisine will have its own famous brands as well-known as the ‘Quanjude’ Peking roast duck.”
　　Herbal cuisine has a long history in China. One explanation of its origin is that in gathering food in the wild, the ancient Chinese found that some plants could be prepared as food as well as being used to cure disease. These special plants with the combined nature of food and medicine are seen as the basis for herbal cuisine.
　　
　　According to historical records, the first professional chef of herbal cuisine appeared in the Chinese emperor’s palace over 1,000 years ago. With the country’s social development, herbal cuisine has gradually become accessible and popular among ordinary people.
　　While traditional Chinese medicine uses more than 5,000 kinds of herbs, according to Li Baohua, Vice Director of the Chinese Association of Herbal Cuisine Studies, only 108 herbs are permitted to be used in herbal cuisine.
　　Since the end of the 1990s, many big cities in China have been hit by a fever for herbal cuisine. “Serving herbal cuisine” has been adopted as a marketing strategy by small restaurants as well as those in five-star hotels.
　　
　　Concept is misused
　　
　　HERBAL DRINK BAR: A restaurant in Beijing specializing in herbal cuisine displays various types of herb-infused alcohol for customers to choose from
　　“The popularity of herbal cuisine reflects the rise of people’s living standards,” said Li. “Chinese people are paying more attention to the cultural and health aspects of their diet.”
　　However, due to a lack of supervision, the concept of herbal cuisine has been abused. For example, many restaurants treat herbal cuisine as an advertising catchword, while their chefs know nothing about the characteristics or preparation of such food. Wang cited a very common example: some restaurants add some traditional herbs to an ordinary dish and then call it a herbal cuisine dish.
　　As a matter of fact, the culinary expertise required for herbal cuisine is much more complicated and intricate. While preparing herbal medicine dishes, the chef should bear in mind the body type and health situation of diners, the season and the geographical environment, and base the choice of herbs on these factors. According to traditional Chinese medicine theories, spring is the best season for taking nourishment for the liver, summer for the spleen and stomach, autumn for the lungs and winter for the kidneys.
　　Casual preparation of herbal cuisine without knowledge of the nature of herbs could harm diners’ health, experts say.
　　However, Wang believes an important factor inhibiting the rapid development of herbal cuisine is people’s mistaken perceptions about it. To be specific, traditional herbal cuisine has for a long time placed excessive emphasis on its curative effects and neglected the culinary pleasure for diners. Under such guidelines, herbal cuisine dishes were not appetizing at all and the medicinal taste kept many diners away.
　　“My herbal cuisine dishes are first and foremost savory dishes,” Wang said. “I would first make sure that they are delicious and then think about their nutritional functions.”
　　Wang has been in the herbal cuisine industry for nearly 10 years. When he started as an apprentice cook in 1997, his mentor was Jiao Mingyao, one of China’s top-notch herbal cuisine chefs. Jiao used to be the head chef of Tongrentang Emperor Food, the restaurant under China’s best-known pharmaceutical brand, Tongrentang, which was appointed to prepare prescriptions for the emperor.
　　Wang has developed a patented “100-herb banquet” that includes over 200 dishes.
　　“The recipes for all these dishes have been put to the strictest test,” Wang said. “The job for our chefs is to make them savory and achieve the best combination of medicine and diet.”
　　According to Wang, Beijing has only seven or eight restaurants specializing in a medicinal diet, but there are innumerable restaurants in the city using the term herbal cuisine for self-promotion. Wang explained that there are two reasons for such a scenario.
　　For one thing, there is a limited supply of qualified herbal cuisine chefs. Although the Chinese Association of Herbal Cuisine Studies began to intensify training of herbal cuisine chefs several years ago, the gap between demand and supply remains large. According to Wang, the salary of an herbal cuisine chef is two or three times that of an ordinary chef. Wang’s restaurant has 400 seats and only four herbal cuisine chefs.
　　For another thing, the popular view of not taking medicine when it can be avoided is harming the popularization of herbal cuisine restaurants. Wang said the ad campaigns for the medicinal diet industry have changed their slogans to “health preservation” and “health protection” to overcome public reluctance.
　　
　　Gap in understanding
　　
　　“Many people refuse to try a medicinal diet due to their misunderstanding that a medicinal diet is a kind of medicine, which is not true,” said Wang.
　　Many herbal cuisine restaurants are trying to change course to cater to customers. Giving up the model of singularly pursuing the medical effects, they are paying increasing attention to the tastiness of the food. For example, an herbal cuisine restaurant in China’s southern city of Chengdu developed a new type of edible rose, which earned the restaurant instant fame and a profit of 3 million yuan over six years.
　　“It tastes good and has the fragrance of a rose,” said patron He Xiaofeng.
　　Many customers said the principle reason they like herbal cuisine is its taste. Secondarily, they hope the cuisine can help strengthen their health.
　　But some diners turn to a medicinal diet to find a cure for disease. Wang said his prescribed dishes once cured the chronic constipation of an elderly customer who came to his restaurant for relief.
　　However, Wang emphasized that he would frankly tell a customer not to have too much hope if he or she is seeking a cure from herbal cuisine. “After all, herbal cuisine can only play a supportive role in safeguarding health,” he said. “The effects are usually slow, and not effective for all diseases.”
　　Zhou Jian is an associate professor of nutrition at the Beijing University of Chinese Medicine. She confirmed that the proven effects of herbal cuisine include nourishing the hair, skin, brain and bones, helping in weight loss and improving sexual function. But Zhou cautioned, “Without consulting professionals, nobody should casually eat herbal cuisine.”
　　Wang said if a customer does not have a clear requirement, the waiters and waitresses who have received professional training should give tailored suggestions on ordering based on the physical situation of each customer. These suggestions will be carried out only after being approved by the head chef.
　　“Deliciousness and safety are our top priorities,” said Wang.
　　He said he believes that the herbal catering sector is exhibiting an unhealthy trend of polarization. The fastest-developing sectors are high-end restaurants and low-end restaurants. In contrast, mid-level herbal cuisine restaurants catering to the largest number of customers are developing very slowly.
　　“This is a big market with huge potential,” Wang said.
　　As for the government’s role in promoting the development of medicinal diets, Wang said he believes that government agencies should guide public understanding of herbal cuisine. Another measure is to raise the entry standards for herbal cuisine chefs and further clarify the requirements of the position, which will nurture the healthy and orderly development of the industry.

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