FEW SCANDALS IN China provoke as much outrage as those related to food. This is perhaps only natural in a country that takes immense and justified pride in its culinary heritage. Concerns about public safety, corporate responsibility and regulatory capacity all distil into one essential question: can the food on your table be trusted?
A scandal that has gripped China in recent days poses the question in a different way. It revolves not around safety, but rather around food quality
FEW SCANDALS IN China provoke as much outrage as those related to food. This is perhaps only natural in a country that takes immense and justified pride in its culinary heritage. Concerns about public safety, corporate responsibility and regulatory capacity all distil into one essential question: can the food on your table be trusted?
A scandal that has gripped China in recent days poses the question in a different way. It revolves not around safety, but rather around food quality and the very definition of cooking. Anger has erupted at a popular fast-casual restaurant chain, Xibei, which bills its north-western-style food as fresh and family-friendly. Think of it, roughly, as a big upgrade on America’s Olive Garden chain (with extra scrumptious roast lamb). Xibei was revealed to be serving dishes made with frozen ingredients, often whipped up in advance in central kitchens. The controversy stings because it touches on deeper anxieties—about authenticity in China’s hyper-urban landscape and the emergence of new class divisions.
It all began innocuously enough, with an acerbic comment from a dissatisfied customer, the kind seen on social media anywhere in the world. “Almost all pre-made dishes, and still so expensive. Really disgusting,” fumed Luo Yonghao, an entrepreneur-cum-influencer. Mr Luo has 1.4m followers on Weibo, so his message was bound to attract eyeballs. But Xibei made it even worse. Along with threatening to sue Mr Luo for defamation, Jia Guolong, Xibei’s spirited owner, opened its kitchens for curious customers to see for themselves. And see they did: frozen broccoli with a shelf-life of two years; expensive soups that consisted of tossing bouillon into boiling water; and chefs with minimal training. For middle-class families who viewed Xibei as an affordable indulgence—pricier than their daily choices but perfect for weekends or children’s birthdays—it felt like a betrayal.
Much of the anger has focused on Xibei’s hypocrisy. With nearly 400 locations and more than 6bn yuan ($840m) in annual revenue, it trades on a cosmopolitan craving for field-fresh nourishment. Its restaurants have wooden interiors and tables covered in red-and-white gingham cloths. Screens play videos of chefs kneading dough or lovingly selecting fish for the wok. Windows open onto the kitchens where staff in crisp white uniforms labour over its dishes—or, as it turns out, put the premade parts together.
Chaguan visited a location in Beijing a few days after the controversy began. Just a few tables had customers—far fewer than normal. Some were gastronomic rubberneckers. “I wanted to see for myself,” said Mr Shang, a young man in a fashionable black t-shirt. Others were peeved but not enough to boycott it. “Premade dishes are obviously convenient, but they should indicate that they are made this way,” said Mr Yue, a silver-haired gentleman.
The humbling of Xibei will certainly not spell the end of the premade trend. China’s vastly expanded middle class demands the good life at good prices. Frozen food from central kitchens solves multiple problems: the results are tasty, relatively inexpensive and utterly consistent. How else to satisfy customers in a country that has gone from majority rural just 15 years ago to nearly 70% urban today? It all exposes an inescapable tension. The Chinese culinary dream was captured in “A Bite of China”, the most-watched television documentary of the past decade, which featured exquisite ingredients and heavenly cooking, often in idyllic rural settings. The closest many urbanites can actually come to such fare lies down the glossy corridor of a shopping mall and within a chain like Xibei.
The shift towards pre-made food stems not just from urbanisation but also the evolution of the labour market. Traditionally, being a chef has meant long hours, few holidays, low pay and a hot, smoky kitchen. Few embrace such gruelling work. Centralising the cooking thus makes sense, but it also takes romance away from the food. Most of Xibei’s patrons were surely aware that it represented an industrialised form of cuisine. But customers suspended their disbelief and bought into its cultivated image—until the avalanche of criticism meant they could pretend no longer.
The growth of premade food has been, and will remain, tremendous. Industry analysts estimate that it generated revenue of 400bn yuan in 2022 and will surpass 1trn yuan next year. Vast improvements in China’s cold chain, from storage to distribution, have also helped to bring the experience of Xibei, and restaurants like it, into cities in the hinterland that were once under-served. The government, appreciating the importance of prepared food, drafted its first standards last year. But these were oddly structured: they defined premade food as reheatable prepackaged dishes, so long as they do not include preservatives or come from central kitchens. (Perversely, restaurants using central kitchens and preservatives can thus claim not to be serving premade food, as officially defined.)
Unfair portions
The endpoint may be a two-tiered Chinese restaurant scene, says Xiang Dongliang, a cultural commentator. Most of the market will consist of chains like Xibei—clean, reliable reheaters of decent and sometimes delicious food. Then there will be an upper tier of restaurants cooking truly fresh food. Chefs at these will be stars, commanding high salaries and experimenting with new takes on old favourites. “It will be a polarised situation,” he says.
At its best pre-made food ought to be seen as a great leveller. Take “Buddha jumps over the wall”, a complex Fujianese seafood stew. It used to require ordering a day ahead at high-end restaurants. Now it is available everywhere, anytime. A foodie like Mr Xiang rates the premade version highly: not as refined as the fresh original but a good approximation. To have raised the art of premade cooking to such a standard is a true accomplishment. But for those who love their food—and that is most in China—how galling it is to know that the best you can regularly afford comes from a vacuum-packed bag, cut open and cast into a bowl.
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