While Western-style supermarkets are expanding in China, much meat is still sold fresh in traditional wet markets, where butchers carve up fresh cuts each day, and every part of the pig from the ears to the feet to the offal will be on display and used in various dishes. In Shanghai, delivery drivers load up at midnight at the city’s wholesale meat market and by sunrise they will have delivered 2,500 butchered hogs to markets around the city. Consumer preferences are changing rapidly, though, with younger Chinese spending more time working in factories and offices and less time cooking at home, preferring to eat pre-packaged meals or at restaurants, which tend to use more frozen meats.
