Shanxi Cuisine

Formation and Characteristics of Shanxi Cuisine

Shanxi is located in the east of the Loess Plateau. The basin in South Shanxi was developed quite early, and the farming culture in Shanxi has a history of over 3,000 years. In the past, the people in Northwest Shanxi were mainly engaged in animal husbandry. The abundant five bowls of cereal and meat products provide an ideal environment for the development of the catering trade in the Shanxi province.

Shanxi Cuisine features a wide variety of wheaten food, hence the name the “land of wheaten food.” A saying goes like this: “Shanxi produces a hundred kinds of wheaten food, and each kind offers a hundred tastes.”

Shanxi Cuisine includes a wide variety of meticulously prepared wheaten food; almost all the dishes are oily and juicy, and have a mellow taste; the cooking techniques are very traditional, handed down through generations. They are unsophisticated, crude in most dishes, but subtle in other.

Famous Dishes and Snacks of Some Cities in Shanxi

(1). Taiyuan

Taiyuan is the capital of Shanxi Province. In the city, you can enjoy most of the dishes and snacks from all parts of Shanxi.

Special Local Dishes:

Sweet and Sour Carp—糖醋鲤鱼

Prepared with a carp and various kinds of condiments, this dish tastes sweet and sour.

Braised Whole Duck—锅烧全鸭

Boil a striped duck, steam it and fry it. Wait until the duck is golden yellow in color, then it will be crisp outside and tender inside, with a strong smell.

Chicken Slices with Egg White—芙蓉鸡片

With chicken chest meat as the main ingredient, egg white, edible funguses, onions, ginger, and other seasonings as supplementary ingredients, this dish is pure white in color and delicious in taste.

Braised Sea Cucumber and Onions—葱烧海参

Braised Fish Maws in Cream Sauce—白扒鱼肚

Hot Candied Yams—拔丝山药

It is dessert. Boil cubed yams until they become sugar juice. When customers pick up yams with their chopsticks, many threadlike things appear, hence the name.

Stir-fried Sliced Pork—过油肉

Slice tenderloin, dip the tenderloin slices into a starch paste and stir-fry them. Then the tenderloin is golden yellow in color, and the dish is crisp, soft and tender.

Special Local Snacks:

Tounao—头脑

(Mutton soup with various nutritious ingredients)

Shaved Noodles—刀削面

Mao’erduo—猫耳朵

(A kind of wheaten flour food in the shape of the cat’s ear)

Boyu—拨鱼

(A kind of wheaten food in the shape of fish)

Green Onion Fat Pancake—葱花脂油饼

Fried Millet Cake—黄米油糕

Eggs in Fermented Glutinous Rice—鸡蛋醪糟

(2). Datong

Datong is a city of strategic importance in the north of Shanxi. One of its most famous tourist attractions is the Yungang Grottoes. Apart from various cultural relics, Datong is also home to many special snacks and dishes.

Special Local Dishes：

Datong Chafing Dish—大同火锅

It features a wide variety of ingredients, such as mutton slices, sea cucumber, fish maws, scallops, tendons of beef, mutton or pork, mushrooms and various kinds of vegetables.

Instant-boiled Mutton—涮羊肉

Aromatic and Crisp Chicken—香醉鸡

Preparing the dish involves boiling, steaming and frying a stripped chicken. This dish is crisp and aromatic.

Special Wheaten Flour Snacks：

Fried Millet Cake—黄米油糕

Shaomai—烧卖

(Steamed dumplings with soft dough gathered at the top)

Shaved Noodles—刀削面

Maoer'duo—猫耳朵

Boyu—拨鱼

(3). Shangdang

Shangdang (present-day Lucheng and Changzhi) was known for four dishes in ancient China:

Braised Pork with Soy Sauce—红烧肉

Cut pork into pieces, steam the pork and braise it with a variety of seasonings. also in Hunan Cuisine

Yellow Pork Balls—黄焖丸子

(First, prepare meatballs with minced pork, egg liquid, starch and various kinds of condiments; then fry the meatballs, steam them, before adding edible funguses, slices of bamboo shoots to the meatballs. When the dish is finished, the yellow-colored meatballs are bright in color and delicious in taste.)

Steamed Crisp Pork in Clear Soup—清蒸穌肉

(Fry pork stripes, then add seasonings to the stripes before steaming them)

Pearl-like Pork Elbow Meat--上党糊肘子

(Cut a pork elbow into dices, boil them, cover the pork elbow dices with glutinous rice, add seasonings to them and steam them. The glutinous rice looks like bright pearls, and the dish has a strong taste and smell.)

Interesting Stories of Some Shanxi Dishes

Tounao (brain) 头脑

Tounao (brain) served by the Qingheyuan Restaurant in Taiyuan is one of the most representative delicacies of Shanxi, as well as a masterpiece of the homologous culture of medicine and food of the Chinese nation. Why does a delicacy have such a strange name? Legend has it that Fu Shan, a famous ideologist, politician, and health-care expert in Shanxi, was a very righteous person who opposed the Qing Dynasty. He tried to restore the Ming Dynasty. After the Ming Dynasty was replaced by the Qing Dynasty, Fu Shan who was not willing to serve as an official of the Qing worked hard to overthrow the Qing dynasty. However, his rate of success was very thin. When he felt hopeless, he thought of an implicit way to make his aspiration immortal. He renamed the “Eight-treasure Soup” that he prepared for his old mother “Tounao,” and gave the recipe to the Qingheyuan Restaurant, implying that drinking the brains of the people of the Qing and Yuan dynasties to restore the Ming Dynasty. “Eight treasures” refer to fat mutton, lotus roots, yams, the root of membranous milk vetch, cooking wine, dried orange peels, stewed noodles, and preserved Chinese chives. Fu Shan’s mother drank the “Eight-treasure Soup” for eight years running and lived a long life of 84 years. Later, Tounao was also called “Longevity Soup.”

Sliced Noodles—刀削面

Sliced Noodles, Noodles Served with Thick Gravy as Sauce of Beijing, Yifu Noodles (fried noodles served in soup) of Shandong, Dandan Noodles (noodles with hot sauce) of Sichuan, and Baked Fish and Noodles over a Low Fire of Henan are the five major cooked wheaten food in China.

Sliced Noodles of Shanxi features a delicious taste, as well as special preparation skills. The chef holds a large dough in one hand and grasps a knife with the other hand, slicing the noodles directly into boiling water. The knife never leaves the dough. The chef keeps his arm straight when holding the dough, and slices the thin, long and even noodles without stopping. The noodles in the shape of fish are as white as snowflakes, jumping into the water as quickly as meteors. Viewers often associate the scene with “swallows entering the nest,” “phoenixes flying out of the nest,” and “fish jumping up from the water.” Some chefs slice noodles with one hand, and the others with two hands. The chef slicing the dough with two hands places dough on the head and keeps slicing noodles with both hands at high speed. The chef with the quickest hands can slice 114 times within 30 seconds, and all the noodles are in the same shape and size. Watching the chefs slicing noodles is just like appreciating a performance of acrobatics.

Boyu—拨鱼 (a kind of wheaten food in the shape of fish) 

Boyu is also known as Tiejian, another representative wheaten food of Shanxi Province. Almost all the families in Shanxi are good at preparing Boyu. This snack may be prepared with wheat flour, bean flour, sorghum flour, or the mixture of the flour mentioned above. Boyu is delicious and nutritious. The chef holds a scoop with one hand on which dough is placed, and grasps a short stick with the other hand, poking the “fish-like” noodles directly into the boiling water. Each fish has two pointed ends, and around the middle part, three to four inches long. According to the records, the chef with the quickest hands can make 197 small “fish” a minute. Various kinds of meticulously prepared thick gravy are added to the cooked small “fish”, and then the snack is complete.

Mao’erduo—猫耳朵 (a kind of wheaten flour food in the shape of the cat’s ear)

Mao’erduo is the most popular food in Central and North Shanxi Province. Mao’erduo is prepared with various kinds of grain flour. In Central Shanxi, the people usually make Mao ’erduo with wheat flour and sorghum flour; and in the frigid areas, such as Yanbei and Xinxian County, the locals use oat flour or buckwheat flour to prepared Mao’erduo. As oat flour is soft, many kinds of beautiful patterns can be made. The procedure of preparing Mao’erduo is as follows: Press ready-made dough with two thumbs, push the dough with the thumbs and shape the dough into the shape of the cat’s ear. The skilled chefs can make a great number of beautiful cat’s ear-like pieces in the same size. The “cat’s ear” can then be steamed, fried or stewed over a low fire. When finished, it will be smooth, refreshing and chewy. It is usually served with various kinds of delicious and nutritious gravy.

Shazi Cake—砂子饼

Shazi Cake is a traditional snack of Central and South Shanxi. According to the local custom, one month after a woman gives birth to a child, her parents, relatives or friends would pay a visit to the woman, each carrying a large red bulging bag. All the bags, without exception, would contain crisp and aromatic Shazi cakes. It is also called “Scar Cake” as its surface is full of bumps and holes like scars. The ingredients for preparing the cake are very common, including flour, edible oil, salt, and five-spice powder. However, the way to make the cake is unusual—Place cobblestones of various sizes on a flat-bottomed pan, warm the pan until it is very hot, place cakes on the cobblestones and bake them. The cake, one foot in diameter, is thin, crisp and fragrant. Because there is little oil in it, the cake is easy to be stored and carried about. One can eat the cake with soup, and he can also soak the cake into the soup before eating it. A saying goes that Shazi Cake is the oldest food of human beings, the fossil of food and a living cultural relic.