This is an engaging and comprehensive study of Chinese cuisine, layered with history and cultural insights. It is the perfect gift for a foodie friend who reads. I found the focus on a "Western" audience a little too prominent and it distracted me from the study of the food and understanding new things. The "meat and two veg are so boring" narrative got especially tedious with some classicist components in the styling of the "average" Britain. The comparision-as-illustration device said more about the author than the reader. It kept foregrounding her assumptions about who might be reading and not the amazing depth of understanding she was offering.