Dear Culinary Backstreets, I’ve heard about “wet markets,” but what are they exactly? And where can I find the best wet markets in Shanghai? Stocked with all the fresh produce and live seafood that hungry Shanghai residents could ever cook up, wet markets are an essential alternative to the brand-name supermarkets vying for their slice of the market share of the planet’s largest population. These markets are so named because the floor tends to be wet, thanks to the live fish flopping around and the vendors’ habit of throwing water on the ground to keep the area clean. They are, however, under constant pressure from the central government’s drive to urbanize the population and modernize facilities, which has led to the steady destruction of the more traditional ones.

Back in 2012 when Culinary Backstreets still had that new car smell, we wrote our first article on xiaolongbao. The investigative report detailed the bun’s regional variations – Shanghai versus Nanjing – and called out our two favorite places to eat each city’s specialty soup dumplings. Understanding, appreciating and loving these local specialties is a part of life for residents of pork-obsessed Shanghai. Arguing the merits of different restaurants’ xiaolongbao is a citywide pastime for both locals and expats alike, but one man has taken the fascination further than the rest of us combined.

Shanghai is a street food lovers' paradise, with carts slinging dumplings, pancakes, noodles, buns and grilled meats on sidewalks across the city, morning, noon and night. These are a few of our favorites. 1: Shengjianbao A Shanghai specialty, shēngjiān mántou (生煎馒头) – or shēngjiān bāo (生煎包), as they’re known everywhere else in China – are juicy pork buns wrapped in bread dough, then arranged in a flat, oil-slicked wok in which the bottoms are deep-fried till they are crispy. Although shengjian mantou can be found on most street corners in the morning, we’re especially fond of the delicious misshapen buns at Da Hu Chun. A Chinese Time-Honored Brand (老字号, lǎozìhào), Da Hu Chun has been splattering grease since the 1930s and, nearly 80 years later, has six restaurants across Shanghai. The venue’s chefs use the rare “clear water” technique, frying the pinched side of the dough face-up to create little Frankenstein buns that might not be as photogenic as the more common “troubled water” variety, but that have a thinner skin that gets extra crisp – and we’ll sacrifice good looks any day if it means better flavor. 2: Guotie

Planning dim sum with friends at Jade Garden might require “Save the Date” cards: The flagship restaurant of Hong Kong’s Maxim’s group is the hottest table in town and – at the time of printing – the next available reservation is six months away. For yum cha aficionados who aren’t deterred by hours-long queues, the Jade Garden does save some tables, but it’s less of a walk-in and more of a mass sit-in.

On one of Shanghai’s busiest shopping streets, amidst the glittering Tiffany & Co, Piaget and Apple stores, Guang Ming Cun is housed in a nondescript four-story building. Glass displays in front offer a glimpse of the braised and dried meats for sale, and around the side you can peek in to watch flaky meat pastries being flipped in a flat wok. But it’s the long lines of middle-aged shoppers patiently waiting outside the building that make Guang Ming Cun unmistakable. During Chinese New Year and Mid-Autumn Festival, these lines can reach up to five hours long.

As the moon starts to wane each January, people throughout China frantically snatch up train and bus tickets, eager to start the return journey to their hometown to celebrate the Lunar New Year (春节, chūnjié) with their family. This year, revelers will make an estimated 3.64 billion passenger trips during the festive season, up 200 million from the previous year. One of the major draws for migrant workers heading home is the chance to eat traditional, home-cooked meals.

Anyone looking for a bit of entertainment or foodie satisfaction while on a layover in Shanghai will need to look well beyond the confines of the airport. Pudong’s international airport may be a huge, mostly gleaming, modern space, but it has some of the most overpriced, bland food and off-brand shopping with little to do beyond making repeated attempts to connect to the free Wi-Fi.

At noon, the line stretches out the door and there’s a noisy rumble of loud voices inside the Ruijin Erlu and Nanchang Lu branch of Fengyu (丰裕), a neighborhood staple that has fed locals for decades deep in the heart of the former French Concession. According to Dianping, China’s most-visited food website, there are 35 branches of this eatery, whose name aptly means “plentiful abundance,” and some are franchised with slightly varied menus. This branch is state-owned, and it opens early, like most of Shanghai. (Latecomers will find most of the dishes sold out.)

One of China’s most successful franchise stories comes from Putian, a coastal city in Fujian with a population of about 3 million. The province is probably known best for the many who leave it, especially those who have been smuggled into the United States by snakeheads, and including domestic emigrants who move to hub cities, bringing their culinary traditions along with them.

Nanxiang Steamed Dumpling Restaurant has one of the most historic queues in town. The creators of Shanghai’s famous soup dumpling have a suburban origin story that turned central when they relocated next to the tourist destination Yu Gardens in 1900, but time hasn’t been on their side. A government-owned company since 1945, Nanxiang’s passé dumplings are ones to take a pass on, even if they didn’t require standing single-file for an hour at peak meal times. But there are some restaurants and food stalls in Shanghai that are well worth the wait.

Editor’s note: In the latest installment of our recurring feature, First Stop, we asked Lillian Chou, former food editor of Gourmet and now a freelance writer in Beijing, where she heads first for food when she arrives in Shanghai. There are several factors that decide where I eat first when I arrive in Shanghai – mostly, it’s whether I’m alone or with friends and what kind of eaters they are and how much time we have.

For visitors looking to get beyond Shanghai’s urban core, among the main attractions are the plentiful water towns that ring the outer suburbs in just about every direction. The name refers to the bygone reliance of these towns on water for irrigation and transport, especially in the form of canals. Billed as ancient villages, the popular destinations tend to be packed with visitors, with traditional foods as the main draw – perhaps due in part to the lack of other activities on offer.

Editor's note: It's Breakfast Week here at CB, and to kick off the series, we first head to a street corner in the heart of Shanghai that offers a remarkable variety of breakfast foods. Stay tuned all this week for more morning dispatches from other CB cities. We’re all guilty of indulging in the complimentary hotel breakfast buffet a little too often while traveling. But in Shanghai, the widest array of street food is on full display in the morning hours, as young professionals and retirees alike gather at their favorite stands for a quick bite with friends or on their way to work.

The hotpot’s storied history stretches back over a millennium in China. The cooking method originated in Mongolia, where legend has it that warriors used their helmets as makeshift pots, boiling strips of horse and lamb meat over campfires to sustain them as they made their way south to breach the Great Wall. As hotpot cooking proliferated, regional variations took their toll on the meal’s simplicity, earning it the nickname of “Chinese fondue” among some Westerners.

Editor’s note: This post is the first installment of “Best Bites of 2013,” a roundup of our top culinary experiences over the last year. Stay tuned for “Best Bites” from all of the cities Culinary Backstreets covers. Deng Ji Chuan Cai Culinary bucket lists are some of the best ways to discover our friends’ hidden gems: expat foodies are only willing to give up their proprietary favorites when they’re heading home.