Cucumbers can also be stir-fried with thin slivers of meat for a refreshing dish or used in a vegetarian dish with scrambled eggs, day lily buds and black wood-ear fungus.

You can also use cucumbers in soups.

And of course, sliced cucumbers are the perfect accompaniment to a platter of roast meat, a bowl of thick rich red-cooked pork or simply steamed chicken.

Julienned, they freshen up everything from noodles to spring rolls. The classic banquet starter of thinly sliced jellyfish would lose much of its attraction if cucumbers were not used in it.

Cucumbers also make the most refreshing pickles. Steeped in sugar and vinegar, cucumbers keep their crunch all year round. They are also soaked in sweetened soy sauce and eaten as a side dish served with rice porridge.

Sometimes, they are chopped up and made into relishes and chutneys spiced up with fennel, cumin, chili peppers or numbing Sichuan peppercorns. It's safe to say almost every region in China has its own version of the cucumber pickle.

As far as a vegetable goes, few are more versatile than the humble cucumber.