Special dishes promise to make 5-5 Shopping Festival a delight

Merchants and brands are flocking to unveil limited-edition food offerings as they embrace the 5-5 Shopping Festival, a two-month-long gala in Shanghai to boost domestic consumption.

Freshippo, the online-to-offline retail chain of Alibaba Group, is ready to release more than 60 new dishes for the festival, with several of them featuring the blend of time-honored brands with popular cuisines.

For instance, the company has come up with an iced, yellow rice wine-flavored crayfish, which is a summer time favorite snack typically featuring pungent and spicy among Chinese diners.

"We really want to bring old-time memories to local diners, as they get a bite of innovative dishes," said Chen Meijun, Freshippo Shanghai's manager for catering and "3R", which stands for the company's pledge to offer 'Ready to cook, Ready to eat and Ready to eat' food supplies.

Teaming up with local brewery Shanghai Jinfeng Wine, Freshippo is using rice liquor as an ingredient to produce one chocolate cake, one honey cake and a traditional Chinese-style pastry.

Apart from cross-over inventions on food recipe, Freshippo said it plans to distribute coupons worth over 1.2 billion yuan for the shopping bonanza, bring in some 500 merchants to serve 10 million shoppers in Shanghai and nationwide.

Disneytown, the shopping, dining and entertainment complex in the Shanghai Disney Resort, is also working up an appetite with unique culinary offerings as it celebrates its fifth anniversary.

Special dishes span from the first Cheesecake Factory in Asia, to the popular local tea brand Hey Tea, and the newly added celebrity hotpot restaurant Coucou, all serving to create tantalizing dining options for any time of the day.

BreadTalk's outlet in Disneytown is introducing limited-edition donuts and muffins to celebrate the resort's fifth anniversary ahead of the Labor Day vacation, which also draws the curtain of the 5-5 Shopping Festival.

"Though upgraded merchandise, shop designs and services, we want to create a childlike vibe full of imagination and possibilities," said brand director Luo Yonghua.

Local restaurant chain Shanghai Min aims to pamper diners visiting the Disneytown with traditional sautéed shrimp, noodles mixed with scallion, oil and soy sauce, as well as minced crab meat and bean curd.