As one of the most refined and celebrated Chinese food traditions, Cantonese cuisine has seduced gourmets around the world. 

The Michelin Guide, perhaps the world's most respected collection of food criticism, recently launched an edition dedicated solely to fine Cantonese food.

It's the first Michelin guide that focuses on a specific type of cuisine, instead of a restaurant as it has usually done. It covers 291 restaurants in Asia, Europe, and North America.

Cantonese food is one of China's finest cuisines. And its history has a global flavor as well. Original Chinese immigrants to many countries were mainly Cantonese, people from China's southern Guangdong Province. When they went to the United States in the 1800s, for example, they took their food with them.

Andrew Rogers is a hotel manager and has worked for three years in Guangdong Province. He says the beauty of Cantonese food is that there are so many choices with it, "You can go to Hong Kong and go down the streets to have some of the best flavors you'll ever have, whether it's just some dim sum or some soup. But also, the finest cuisine that I have seen in China, has also been the Cantonese food."

As a food writer and consultant for food documentaries, Dong Keping has been to Cantonese restaurants around the world. He points out that Cantonese cuisine was the first Chinese regional cuisine to take hold in other parts of the world, “Compared with other regional cuisines, Cantonese cuisine has been most the interactive globally... It learns from other cultures and makes use of foreign culinary techniques and kitchen utensils."

Chef Cheung Siu Kong is from Hong Kong. He is the Chinese executive chef of Summer Pavilion, a Cantonese restaurant in Singapore, which has earned one Michelin star. Cheung brings the creativity level of Cantonese cuisine up a notch, blending its cooking methods with a variety of international flavors. Poached rice with lobster meat is his signature dish. It is a delicate dish that uses both crispy and steamed rice to deliver different textures. Upon serving, pour into the bowl a superior stock of lobster broth.

In fine dining restaurants across the world, Cantonese food now can be served as a full course meal, featuring an appetizer, a soup, a main dish and dessert.

Dong says that's a good sign. "How do we introduce Chinese-flavor specialties in a way people from other countries feel comfortable with? That's the question we need to think about when we try to build up a Cantonese restaurant or a Chinese restaurant in the future."

Cantonese cuisine, a regional specialty that enjoys a worldwide reputation. Only a more internationalized expression can help more people appreciate a cuisine with universal appeal.