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$37,000
dinner hard to stomach? Not for the rich in China
Asians
love good food
When
it comes to epicurean indulgences, nothing sends Chinese taste buds - and
wallets - into overdrive like Chinese New Year celebrations.
This year, more than ever, restaurants
throughout China are flexing their culinary muscles to entice customers with
reunion dinner packages that cost up to a mind-boggling 188,000 yuan
(S$37,000) a table.
Yet consumers are snapping them up faster
than you can say 'gong xi fa cai'.
Those who can stomach the 188,000-yuan
feast served at a restaurant in south-west China's Chongqing municipality
will get to enjoy, among other delicacies, a chicken soup boiled with
100-year-old ginseng.
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Goodies galore
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What's on the
reunion dinner menu at high-end restaurants:
- Staples:
Shark's fin, abalone, bird's nest
Highlights:
- South Sea
Fishing Village in Guangzhou city is giving a
bottle of wine,produced during the 19th century
Qing Dynasty and designated as an artefact, for
its 88,800-yuan reunion dinner set for 12
people.
- For the
record-setting 188,000-yuan set offered by a
restaurant in the central municipality of
Chongqing, diners can pamper themselves with a
bowl of chicken soup boiled with 100-year-old
ginseng.
- A restaurant
in south China's Nanning city is serving pu'er
tea brewed with 30-year-old leaves for its
99,999-yuan sets.
Freebies:
- Dapubu Hotel
in Guilin, a tourist destination in the southern
Guangxi region, is splashing out on wine,
digital cameras and even laptops for its three
most expensive packages costing up to 31,288
yuan a table.
Extras:
- South Sea is
deploying managerial staff to wait on diners.
- A restaurant
in the eastern city of Nanjing has hired a chef
for 500,000 yuan a year to do justice to its
20,000-yuan-a-table feast.
- Popular
restaurants such as Beijing's Hong Bin
Restaurant and Tong Chun Garden have resorted to
shift bookings - 5pm to 7pm for the more
expensive slot, with the other starting at
7.30pm - to accommodate demand.
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The soup alone costs 160,000 yuan, the
restaurant has claimed.
Another restaurant, South Sea Fishing
Village, based in south China's Guangdong province, was the first to make
headlines last month with its 88,800 yuan-a-table offering.
The price is nine times the average
annual salary of urban residents and 88 times that of a typical mass-market
package. Top on the restaurant's menu is a bottle of vintage 1845 wine that
has been designated by the State Cultural Relics Bureau as a protected
artefact.
Luxury staples such as top-grade abalone,
shark's fin, bird's nest and even porridge cooked with France-produced Evian
mineral water round off the nine-course feast for 12.
'These dishes cost more than 90,000 yuan
if ordered a la carte,' said South Sea promotions manager Hu Yuan.
She told The Sunday Times that this year
is the first time the restaurant is offering such a high-priced set, in
addition to regular tables costing 4,000 yuan and below.
'The promotional menu at 88,800 yuan is a
treat for our regular patrons for the Spring Festival,' Ms Hu said.
In Chinese, the number '8' is pronounced
similar to the word 'fa', which means 'striking it rich'.
Ms Hu said response to the package has
been 'good', but declined to reveal the actual number of reservations so
far. However, she disclosed that all 120 private rooms at the restaurants'
two outlets have been fully booked since last month.
For China's food and beverage industry,
this year's Chinese New Year eve is a red-letter day in more ways than one.
One third of urban residents across the
country are expected to fill restaurants for reunion dinners on Tuesday,
according to a poll of 2,000 people in cities such as Beijing and Guangzhou
by the Social Survey Institute of China.
In the eastern city of Nanjing, for
example, business on new year's eve alone is estimated to ring in 200
million yuan for the 20,000 restaurants.
Inevitably, however, criticisms abound
over the exorbitant charges compared to more palatable price tags of past
years.
But many others simply shrug off the
trend as a product of the booming market economy.
Said Jilin University legal studies
professor Dong Jinyu: 'Without the largesse of the minority, the masses
would not be spurred to work hard to spend as much.' - by Lee Seok
Hwai SINGAPORE
BUSINESS TIMES 6 Feb 2005
The price of perfect: cooking
Financial Post Money tallies the costs of self-improvement and takes you on
a crash course to the perfect persona
LEARN TO COOK FOR $6,873.75
Aside from the fact that festive-December is almost upon us and you've got
hungry friends and family to make merry -- Food Network junkies all of them
--cooking is now the new yoga: the hobby of choice for intense,
entrepreneurial and hard-driving worker bees.
COST CHECK
One month at Le Cordon Bleu Ottawa
..................$4,600
Now Designs chef's hat
.............................................. $12
Wustoff 10-piece knife set
.................................... $1,199
All-Clad pot set
......................................................... $870
The Joy of Cooking
................................................ $53.50
Donna Hay's Modern Classics Book 1
............... $34.95
Danica apron
.............................................................. $30
Burnguard oven mitts
.................................................. $54
Paderno cotton tea towel
........................................... $2.50
Coriander and Olive Tree Fragrant Kitchen
Spray from Fruits &
Passion........................................................................
$18
TOTAL
.....................................................................$6,873.75
KITCHEN AID Drop in for a month of
intensive classical French cuisine and pastry instruction with Executive
Chef Frédéric Filliodeau, left, at Le Cordon Bleu Paris's Ottawa Culinary
Arts Institute ($4,600) and master the leek tart and the Genoese sponge
cake. For 30 hours a week you'll observe, chop and stir with master chefs
and fellow students from all over the continent: the school is the only one
of its kind in North America. You can attend year-round but the kitchens
crowd to capacity during the summer so book early.
JUST IN CASE Should the worst occur, mask
burnt-sauce smells with Coriander and Olive Tree Fragrant Kitchen Spray from
Fruits & Passion ($18).
BOOK LEARNING The best selling cookbook
in the world is still The Joy of Cooking, says Jennifer Grange, assistant
manager at The Cookbook Store in Toronto. For inspiration, drool over the
photos in Donna Hay's Modern Classics Book 1 ($34.95).
EQUIPMENT Clear away the take-out menus
and make space for the best in knives and pots. A 10-piece Wüsthof set will
make any chef envious at $1,199. Then follow the foodian stars and pick up a
10-piece, all-stainless steel All-Clad pot set ($870). Not only do the
handles not get hot, "people like Martha and Emeril use them,"
says Carolyn Lee of Williams-Sonoma in Toronto.
COUNTER FASHIONS Your grandma wore an
apron and so should you. Just skip the ruffles and reach for a classy
blue-striped number from Danica ($30). Protect hands with matching blue
Tucker Burnguard oven mitts ($54/pair) and toss a jaunty and absorbent
Paderno cotton tea towel over your shoulder ($2.50). The latter comes in
pretty-leaf and manly bug prints. Tug on a Now Designs chef's hat ($12) to
really look the part.
- by Julie McCann
National
Post
23 Nov 2002
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