Geography and similarity of regional cuisines in China

TL;DR

This study uses online recipe data to analyze how geography influences the similarity of Chinese regional cuisines, revealing proximity as a key factor over climate.

Contribution

It introduces a data-driven model linking geographic proximity to cuisine similarity, advancing understanding of cultural evolution in food.

Findings

Geographical proximity influences cuisine similarity more than climate.

A new model of regional cuisine evolution is proposed.

Online recipe data effectively captures cultural culinary patterns.

Abstract

Food occupies a central position in every culture and it is therefore of great interest to understand the evolution of food culture. The advent of the World Wide Web and online recipe repositories has begun to provide unprecedented opportunities for data-driven, quantitative study of food culture. Here we harness an online database documenting recipes from various Chinese regional cuisines and investigate the similarity of regional cuisines in terms of geography and climate. We found that the geographical proximity, rather than climate proximity is a crucial factor that determines the similarity of regional cuisines. We develop a model of regional cuisine evolution that provides helpful clues to understand the evolution of cuisines and cultures.