A few steps into the Hakka Town restaurant's dining room transports visitors to what seems like a rustic southern eatery where guests can explore a different side of Han cuisine and culture.

The interior of the restaurant seems to come straight from a mountainous Hakka village, with traditional Hakka-style doors opening up into the dining room, worn, dark wooden tables and chairs, and paper lanterns hanging from the ceiling. "The decoration follows the Hakka spirit. It's simple, historic, and gives customers a feeling of returning to nature," says restaurant owner Yang Guang.

Hakka cuisine, also called Dongjiang cuisine, manifests the simplicity of Hakka life; cooks keep spices and oils to a minimum in order to preserve the original flavor of each dish's ingredients. Chicken and duck are a focus of Hakka cuisine, while seafood, especially shrimp, is popular as well. Dishes tend to be braised in delicate, sweet sauces or stir-fried with a slightly salty flavor.

The use of duck and chicken, along with stir-fry methods, may not seem like a huge departure from traditional Han cuisine. Indeed, the Hakka people are actually a subset of the Han ethnic majority who migrated to southeast China's Guangdong and Fujian provinces in ancient times. Because they are not native to those lands, the local ethnic groups called the Hakka people "guest families."

After migrating to the south, they set up communities in mountainous regions, where they live in round houses. The Hakka language and many other aspects of their culture retain characteristics of ancient Han culture. "Hakka culture is a living fossil of ancient Chinese study," says Zhou Jiemin, the Chief Officer of the Meizhou People's Overseas Association in Beijing, which is an association for Hakka people who have migrated from Meizhou city in Guangdong province.

VietNamNet/Xinhuanet