清末民初中國受到西方文化的影響並不僅止於軍事、政治、思想，對於民生亦是影響甚巨，不論是食、衣、住、行無一不受影響。而「食」對於中國人來說，雖是日常瑣事，卻舉足輕重，從食材到禮儀，發展了數千年之久，對於吃更有自己的一套哲學；在面臨到西方飲食文化傳入時，中國人不僅抱著好奇的心態去探索，另一方面亦從民族優劣來比較中西的飲食，牛肉因此開始出現在上海居民的餐桌上。番菜館的設立是爲了滿足中國人吃西餐的好奇心，由於價昂，因此上番菜館也成爲富人炫耀財富的方式，然而西餐不僅僅是口味上與中餐有極大差異，在用餐禮儀、與餐具的使用上亦與中餐大相逕庭。營養素觀念的引進，更讓中國人對於食物有根本上的新認識，也導致了現代烹飪學之發展。除此之外，飲食更與現代衛生觀念密不可分，除了維持生命之所需以外，更與疫病息息相關，飲食衛生因此在傳統意義上更加增了現代衛生之涵義。

Department of History, National Chung Cheng During the last years of the Qing Dynasty, China was influenced by Western culture not only inmilitary affairs, politics, and ways of thinking but also in people's livelihood, including food, clothing, housing and transportation. Though food appears trivial, the Chinese consider it crucial and have been developing a
philosophy of food ranging from ingredients to dining etiquette for
thousands of years. The Chinese explored Western food culture with
curiosity when it was introduced. On the other hand, they comparedChinese and Western food from the perspective of national strengths and weaknesses. Hence beef began to be served on the dining table in Shanghai and there were Fan-cai ("foreign food") restaurants satisfying the Chinese' curiosity. Dining at Fan-cai restaurants was costly and adopted by the rich as a means to show off. Nevertheless the flavors of Western and Chinese food were radically different; dining etiquette and tableware also strikingly diverged from each other. The introduction of the notion of nutrients led the Chinese to delve deeper into the fundamentals of food and develop modern gastronomy. In addition, diet became inseparable from contemporary health concepts. Diet, besides sustaining lives, was also closely connected with diseases. Therefore traditional dietary hygiene came to be supplemented with modern health concepts