We spent one week in October of 2001 and one week in January 2002 in Shanghai, China. The purpose of the visit was to explore the opportunities for a small flavor house to do business in China, as well as learn as much about the local tastes as possible.

We arrived at the new Airport in PuDong - brand new, very nice, big, easy to navigate, but almost empty. I think our flight was the only one arriving at the time.

Stayed at the Portman Ritz Carlton in the old section of Shanghai, which was voted the best hotel in Southeast Asia in 2001. We arrived a day after the APEC Economic Meeting ended, and followed President Bush into the hotel. The city was closed to all traffic except those vehicles with an APEC sign, which our car had. Getting to the hotel from the airport was about a 40-minute drive over brand new highways. This plus the fact that there was no traffic made for a very pleasant, fast trip.

My first experience with Chinese cuisine was for breakfast - a western-type buffet with the usual eggs, ham, bacon, etc., one gets in the states. The pastries and Danish served were very bland. Fruit pieces on the Danish had no taste and the cheese used was almost tasteless. No comparison to the pastry of New York or Miami. The cooked ham was excellent, moist and slightly smoked. We did not try the traditional Chinese food.

The fruit juices I tried ranged from very poor to good. Watermelon juice was like ground-up whole fruit, with a very strong, artificial taste. Very green - rindy like nonadienal. The apple juice was better, but not too strong in taste, probably made from concentrate. Grape Juice was like watered down Welch's Grape juice. Tomato Juice was terrible, with little tomato character. Even a shot of Vodka wouldn't help. Grapefruit juice was pink and very bitter, with a cooked and canned taste. Orange juice tasted like it was made from concentrate with added essence. It was of good quality, and was the best of all the juices.

We later tried some local made hard candy which are generally very cheap and of poor quality. The main taste is of cooked sugar with no added flavor. Any mixture of veltol and furaneol would be similar. Other candies had a cooked soy taste, while some were hot like capsicum. There are many local caramel or chewy type confections. One brand, a buttermilk Bobon, was pretty good, with a weak caramel butterscotch character. Another Toffee was buttery, fatty in taste, while another one was like condensed milk.

It seems the taste preferred in chewy local-made candy of the dairy type is of buttery, condensed milk.

One very interesting drink was made with chopped ice, red bean paste and coconut milk. Very refreshing and good tasting. There is a series of fresh milk fruit candy, which are chewy, Toffee type confections. The flavor types are mainly condensed milk, caramel and blends of fruits with dairy, such as strawberry and cream, kiwi and cream, melon and cream. The fruit components are generally of the old fashioned types and the cream part is lactonic. Some are very strong in Vanillin, vanitrope character.

Flavored toothpaste is pretty popular. There is an apple flavor, which is terrible. Most of the flavors are minty, peppermint types, which are pretty good. Some of the toothpaste bases are very putty-like and stay in your mouth forever, while others are fine.

We visited a supermarket, which was four stories high. The bottom level is for bicycle parking and taxi pickup, as hardly anyone has a car. They all use the bus system, taxis or motor-scoters and bicycles. Only the very rich and politicians have private cars. You cannot rent a car to drive yourself in Shanghai. No avis or Hertz - sorry. If you rent a car and driver for a day the cost is roughly $80.00 plus gas.

This supermarket was HUGE and seemed to cater to westerners. You could get anything you needed here from furniture to live fish. They had live shrimp that were the size of a Maine lobster. Yogurt is popular and featured flavors such as strawberry, kiwi, and pineapple. There was a large selection of dried fruits and nuts, some flavored with smoke and heat. In general I didn't like them. The supermarket carried a large selection of local wines and flavored alcohol.

In the past, produce was sold by weight. This led to the farmers pumping water into items like oranges and watermelons. Today everything is sold by the single piece. However the Chinese still believe that heavier fruit is better, so the farmers still pump in the water- it's all in what you get used to.

There is a shopping area very similar to a flea market in the USA. You can buy all kinds of "knock-off" items, such as "Rolex" watches for $35 to $50. They look and feel just like a real Rolex and actually work - for how long I don't know. You can buy Mont Blanc pens for $5 to $7. Louis Vitton purses for under $30. Gucci belts and wallets for next to nothing. All this stuff looks so real you find it difficult to tell the fake from the real stuff.

The great thing about this marketplace is that you bargain for everything. The prices may start at 200 Chinese Yen, but you only end up paying 50 Chinese yen. Great place to shop! (Everybody loves you when you come home!)

The lunch and dinner in the local Chinese restaurant is very reasonable but very Chinese. Everything is served "a Ia carte" family style - that is, all the dished are served on a lazy Susan table and everyone eats from the same dish using chopsticks. Not too appetizing at first, but you get used to it.

All parts off the animal are used in one form or another. Shrimp is usually served with the shell and head attached, which is difficult to eat with chopsticks. All parts of the chicken and duck are used, including the feet. Duck feet are considered a delicacy by some.

We visited a restaurant that serves fondue style food. We think of Fondue as melted cheese or chocolate into which you dip bread, cake or fruit. Not in China. The Fondue is served in a large stainless steel bowl that is divided in half. One side in filled with chicken soup with added garlic cloves, hot peppers and onions. The other side is plain chicken soup. The whole bowl is heated by a gas burner under the bowl in the middle of your table. You then cook what you desire in whichever side you prefer. Items cooked are thinly sliced beef with a lot of fat, live shrimp on a skewer, pig brain, congealed goose blood, tofu, chicken pieces, small cabbage, spinach, all kinds of greens and everything else but the kitchen sink. Again, everyone fishes out their food with chopsticks and eats directly from the pot. You do have a small bowl for the soup, if you wish. I actually lost weight in China.

Dumplings are very popular with soup for lunch. Rice is never served unless you request it. Big difference from Chinese food in the USA

Noodles and tofu generally replace rice. In all the Chinese cooking, the only spices I could pick up on were ginger, garlic and hot peppers. We found one bakery shop near our hotel, which made cookies and small muffins. The muffins are usually chocolate flavored with some nuts, but no other flavor. One cookie had cinnamon in it, but all the others were bland with a slight butter note.

We had the urge for ice cream one night while walking on a main shopping street. Found some Hagen Daz in a store, which was kept in a locked glass-lined freezer. The price was $3.50 for an ice cream bar. Very expensive compared to local made product.

The most popular sodas are Coke & Pepsi, followed by Seven Up and Orange drinks. I didn't taste any local sodas (afraid of the local sanitation).

The tobacco industry is controlled by the Chinese government and is almost impossible to break into unless you have connections.

The alcoholic industry seems less difficult to get into. The distilleries are known as wineries. The Chinese like their alcohol, with most preferring imported brandy and Scotch whisky. The poorer people drink the local cordials and wines where the potential flavor business is.

In general, the people in China are very industrious, busy and clean. You see more homeless in San Francisco or Atlanta than Shanghai. The young girls and women in Shanghai will walk holding hands or with their arms around each other. I thought the place was loaded with gays, until the person I was with told me this is the local tradition. I didn't see any guys doing the same!

Had a suit hand made using a fabric of 10% cashmere and 90% wool, fully lined with silk. Fits good and feels so nice against the body, and cost less than $300. Can't find that in the USA.

Shanghai is a very large city with a population of over 17 million people. It seems that 90% of the population carry a cell phone and at least 70 - 90% smoke cigarettes. It's almost impossible to hold a conversation without being interrupted by a cell phone call. There is the old city, which is being modernized, and the new city, PuDong, which is like brand-new. The buildings are all of modern glass design but still Oriental in character. Shanghai is the commercial center of China, with a beautiful new International airport, a very good port, good highways, and a free trade zone where most foreign investment and manufacturing is taking place.

The flavor business seems to be split up with 30% of the business going to foreign food companies such as Nestle, Unilever, Coke, Pepsi etc., with the other 70% going to local companies. Most of the local flavor and perfume companies in China are very old and do not have access to the latest technology.

The flavors they produce are what we made forty years ago. There is good potential business dealing with these companies, rather than going after the 30% of large foreign companies that all the major flavor houses are going after.

The total flavor sales in China are estimated at $200 million. There are 1.2 Billion people in China and they all have to eat and drink. If you can pick up 2 or 3 percent of the flavor business you'll do very well.

Business in China is done on a "who you know" basis. Much like the good ole' boy system used in the south years ago. You must have a Chinese person working with you to do any business. Most transactions are done at night over dinner and drinks. Chinese businessmen work all hours of the day and night, Saturday and Sundays included. The use of favors is widely conducted and appreciated by both sides. The host one night may well be the guest the next night.

Knowing any person in the government is extremely important in getting business. You must also get to know the local tastes and customs, which are obviously quite different than ours.

A great deal of patience is necessary to be successful in China. However, the potential is worth the wait.