Discussion of foodstuffs and the Columbian Exchange typically focuses on trans-Atlantic trade, following the introduction of plants like potatoes and tomatoes to Europe, and the flow of livestock to the New World.
Did the globalization of food resources dramatically alter or influence cuisine in communities across the Pacific Ocean?
Thanks in advance!
I can only say a few things about China as I'm not familiar with how new world food was received elsewhere in Asia. As early as the mid 16th century we have an abundance of written records of potatoes and maize. The authoritative Materia Medica by Li Shizhen recorded both the characteristics and medical value of these two.
During the Qing crops such as potatoes and maize were encouraged by the government, and they were instrumental in increasing productivity of farmland in China, especially in more marginal farmland such as hillsides, etc. There is some evidence that the population explosion that took place in the 18th century was due to introduction of a number of these crops and their contribution to overall caloric production.
Some scholars such as Mark Elvin have argued that without these crops productivity of land in China was unlikely to have risen as most farmland was already intensively farmed and fairly saturated. By being able to utilize land unsuitable to wheat or rice cultivation, these new world staples were very significant in their impact.
A recent paper on the introduction of potatoes to the inland Shaanxi province can be found here
As for cuisine, that part I'm not as certain. Obviously people figured out ways to cook them, but as far as I'm aware potatoes and the like were not (and largely still are not) viewed as high class food, which means they get a lot less attention in the gourmand written record.
But then you have chili peppers, which as you probably know practically defines Sichuan cuisine as well as a number of other lesser local cuisines along with the use of Chinese peppercorns. Tomatoes also occupy an important place in Chinese cooking, and maize and potatoes are crucial staples in many areas. By the Qing these were already well developed and there are plenty of records in locality and personal writing of the consumption of some of these. Chinese food today would look very different without many of these ingredients
I and /u/wotan_weevil previously wrote some comments in the threads on the similar topic below: