A FOOD TRADITION
New Zealand Chinese cuisine
New Zealand Chinese cuisine developed through goldfield communities, market gardening, family cooking, cafés and takeaway shops, especially from the nineteenth century onward. It draws on Cantonese and other Chinese traditions while adapting ingredients, dining formats and flavor profiles to local conditions and customers. Common techniques include stir-frying, steaming, deep-frying, roasting and braising, with rice, noodles, pork, chicken, seafood and seasonal vegetables used extensively. Representative dishes and formats include chop suey, New Zealand-style chow mein, sweet-and-sour pork, egg foo young and roast meats served with rice. The tradition is shared with wider Chinese diasporic cooking and should not be treated as an exclusively New Zealand invention.
ONE DISH, DIFFERENT PLACES
How the dish changes by place.
Compare regional styles of dishes linked to this cuisine: the city or region, the local name and what changes in the bowl or on the plate. These are food traditions; individual cooks have their own versions.
Regional comparisons are still being added.
We haven’t documented local versions for this cuisine yet. Explore its dishes while this section grows.
Explore the dishes →Catalogue preview Cuisine connections may be unreviewed. Regional comparisons include their food references and do not establish the ingredients of a particular meal.