Crowds gather last week in Anhui province to mark tofu's birthplace and its long history.

People outside of China probably realize now that the country enjoys the noise, color and crowds of grand public spectacles – especially during Lunar New Year or much-ballyhooed state banquets.

Zhang Yimou impressed a global audience last year with his opening ceremony to the Beijing Olympics.

The Chinese Bean Curd Culture Festival, which is Anhui province’s annual celebration to mark the birthplace of the food, is no different.

The festival held in Huainan ended last week and drew big lights, scores of people, a large television audience and numerous entertainers – including Korean pop stars – and businesspeople.

More than 2,000 years ago, Liu An, the grandson of a Chinese emperor, told his assistants to make a medicine that would prolong his life.

As a daoist (taoist), he wanted a long life and an elixir to help.

His assistants arrived in Huainan, used fresh mountain water and soybeans in their medicinal pursuit. They eventually realized they had created a new type of food, as the story from China goes. 

Judging from one video posted on YouTube from this year’s government-sponsored event, there was a focus on the Korean pop star group that bloggers fulllyricseng and liltwillee identify as Super Junior-M.

(I couldn’t have identified this group of singers. So, thank you fulllyricseng and liltwillee. I only understand pop stars from Asia to be a general concept. As in: Young people, typically popular, with stylish haircuts and fashionable clothing and who sing, often about love.)

The singers talked about which dishes they like, including mapo tofu, bean curd soup and chou – or smelly – tofu.

A mapo tofu comment from one of the singers earned a “thumbs up” gesture from the mistress of ceremonies, who said it is the most famous and traditional Chinese dish.

She also talked about how the singers were well informed about tofu dishes.

Interestingly enough on this YouTube page, online banter broke out among some commenters.

One person was concerned that the mistress of ceremonies during the interview pushed one of the singers out of the group on stage.

What would have been more eye catching, though, would have been an easy-to-find video stream of the top Chinese chefs preparing bean curd dishes at this annual festival which started in 1992.

Iron Chef has a great bean curd video. YouTube also has one of a Chinese chef making mapo tofu.

Organizers for this year’s festival, though, set up a special bean curd Web site that includes photos. The information is in Chinese but Google’s translation device should be able to help.

It looked there were plenty of activities to keep tofu enthusiasts busy, including an awards ceremony, family cooking competition and cocktail reception.

One hundred families competed in this year's bean curd cooking competition, part of Anhui province's annual tofu festival. Photo source: beancurd.org

Since the 1990s, the festivals have drawn a total of about 90,000 people from the province, China and other countries. In 2000, for example, an estimated 300 scholars attended bean curd cultural seminars at the annual event, the People’s Daily has reported.

From 1992 until 2000, the celebrations reportedly attracted an estimated $1 billion in international investments using today’s exchange rate.

The People’s Daily article did not specify which companies invested the money or where they put it.

Photographs from previous tofu festivals in Anhui have appeared online.

Tofu creations from earlier bean curd festivals in Anhui province.

The Anhui News has posted background information about bean curd and the gala event.

If anyone comes across additional images or videos from this year’s bean curd festival and show chefs working their magic, please send them to me.

Speaking of grand spectacles, the next one in China will occur Oct. 1 – which marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

In another glittery event last year, China set the record last year for making the world’s largest dried tofu – which was marked, naturally, with a big celebration.

This piece of dry tofu set the world's record and measures about 13 feet by 13 feet. It weighs about 4,100 pounds. Photo source: chinadaily.com.cn

I should note that there are other large international meetings this week, one at the United Nations and the upcoming G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh.