Full industrial chain

To meet growing demand for quick and convenient meals during the COVID-19 pandemic, Dingdong Maicai established a pre-made food department in June 2020, which now operates more than 40 factories. Last year, its pepper pork belly and chicken soup products generated sales of 80 million yuan.

Ou Houxi, who is responsible for the platform's pre-made food, said there has been growing demand.

In February, Dingdong Maicai said it was making an offer worth 5 billion yuan to recruit partners across all links of the industrial chain to improve its pre-made food products.

As more than 20 percent of its customers are 30 or younger, the platform is developing more Chinese cuisine pre-made products to meet demand for food with a low oil and salt content. "This year, we are taking a healthier path," Ou said.

Zhu He, food scientist at Dingdong Maicai, has developed a drunken chicken pot product, for which each ingredient and seasoning, including salt, is measured precisely to the gram.

An executive chef at a five-star hotel before switching to food research and development, one problem for Zhu in his new career is how to turn a chef's version of a dish into a pre-cooked product.

"If I boil 2 kilograms of water for two hours in a kitchen, half of it will evaporate, while in the factory only about 20 to 30 kilograms of water per hour will vaporize in a 400-kilogram pot," Zhu said.

"As a chef, I use a whole chicken to make one portion of soup, which is fine. But I needed to think about ways to produce a full portion in each pre-cooked soup product. Finally, we separated the chicken wings and legs, before steaming them. When we package the soup, each part is added in succession.

"In industrial production, each dish is separated in different steps, with each worker only responsible for a single step before all the parts are packaged."

Zhu said the faster a product is frozen, the better it retains its original flavor.

"Working in a hotel, you might only serve certain people, while for pre-made dishes, you cater to all customers. Each day, we are creating new things, and I enjoy experimenting with new dishes," he added.