“There is no such thing as Dian cuisine!” Food and local identity in urban Southwest China

The article asks why it is that projects celebrating regional cuisine may be unsuccessful in gaining recognition from people in the region. It explores how a recent campaign in Yunnan, China attempted to construct a “modern” image for the province through promoting a distinctive, “green” regional cuisine. However, in a context of rapid changes to urban space and the food supply, residents in the provincial capital, Kunming, were ambivalent towards the notion of a regional cuisine. It is argued that to gain recognition locally, public celebrations of regional cuisine must resonate with people’s lived experiences and performances of “their” foods.