Chengdu snacks

Chengdu snacks

Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province, located in the west of Sichuan Basin, and has long been known as “Land of Abundance” and “the City of Gastronomy.” Each place has its way of supporting its inhabitants. Chili was introduced to China in the late Ming Dynasty and Sichuan people immediately fell in love with it, a food material bringing a direct and thorough hot feeling to them. The combination of chili and local pepper of Sichuan lays the primary spicy and hot characteristic of Sichuan cuisine. Chengdu snacks have the same source with Sichuan cuisine, so they have spicy flavor certainly.

In Chengdu, you enjoy snacks with not only your mouth but also your eyes and ears. Following the sound of drums, cymbals, and clappers, you will find various snacks with the appealing smell and looks. Maybe the snacks deeply impressing you so much are made only by the native people of Chengdu. It ranged from various desserts to different noodles, from soft. Glutinous, sweet to spicy, fresh and delicious flavors, Chengdu snacks are in a great variety and have different tastes. In the taste, the Chengdu people loving spicy often create delicious food miraculously.

Jinli ancient street near Chengdu Wuhou Temple is flooded with the crowds, showing a bustling scene. This is a street of Jinli where you can eat different snacks, and many typical local snacks of Chengdu can be found here. Couple’s Beef Lungs in Chili Sauce. Hot and Sour Rice Noodles, Zhong’s Dumplings are all typical Chengdu snacks or Sichuan snacks.

Sandapao (a kind of dessert in Chengdu style) 三大炮 sān dà pào

Sandapao (a kind of dessert in Chengdu style). It is the most popular dessert of Chengdu, called Sandapao. The vendor grabs a glutinous rice ball, divides it into three small parts, and throws them to the center of the drum leather chopping board filled with copper discs. Then they are rapidly rebounded to the bamboo basket filled with soybean flour. Finally, the vendor picks them up, pour a spoon of brown sugar juice on them before they are given to the buyers. It is very funny, and also they taste good.

The history of Shandapao

In Chengdu in the past, many people came to attend the temple fairs, so corresponding different snacks were gathered together. It is not making a snack but dongs a performance for people. It is said that the inspiration for selling in the form of the performance came from the Chengdu people’s habit of liking drinking bowl tea.

Once upon a time, Chengdu people wanted to eat dessert while drinking tea. A person coming to buy glutinous rice cake placed the copper tea tray of bowl tea on the stall owner’s chopping board. Incidentally, the copper tea tray sent out a clear sound with vibration, and the stall owner was enlightened. So, at a fair, he placed some copper tea trays on the chopping board and exerted himself to throw the rice cakes to make a sound to attract people’s attention. From then on, a new snack variety came out. As three parts are included per serving, so this snack is called as Sandapao (Three Bangs).

How to make the Sandapao

The key to whether a clear sound can be produced or the taste is good lies in the making process of the glutinous rice ball. It has a similar making method as Ci Ba (another glutinous rice cake). When the glutinous rice soaked reaches the degree of becoming smashed upon twiddling, it should be placed in a tailor-made wood barrel for steaming. It is called a bamboo steamer. It can have a flat bottom for good breathability of steam. One hour later after continuous steaming, the glutinous rice in the lower layer of the barrel has almost been steamed well, but the rice in the upper part is still hard and uncooked well.

This process of adding water is essential for making delicious Sandapao. After about half an hour, the glutinous rice inside the barrel will be thoroughly cooked. The addition of such water is to make the rice have a flavor of bamboo. It needs about 10 minutes of steaming. In a few minutes, a big tub of rice is pounded well. For running this glutinous rice ball to the copper chopping board then to the bamboo basket has some skills. So, the features of Sandapao are soft, glutinous, fragrant, sweet, and warm, and also lie in sound, color, and shape.

Sliced Beef and Ox Tongue in Chili Sauce 夫妻肺片 fū qī fèi piàn

Sliced Beef and Ox Tongue in Chili Sauce (Couple’s Beef Lungs) in Chengdu's famous food. Many people feel surprised about why no beef lung is included. Because this dish has beef, but the one tasting best is beef head skin, or the offal indeed is better. ( No. 31 of 199 Chinese dishes translation)

The history of Sliced Beef and Ox Tongue in Chili Sauce

Sliced Beef and Ox Tongue in Chili Sauce (Couple’s Beef Lungs, Beef Lungs made by couples) is Chengdu's famous food. Many people feel surprised about why no beef lung is included. Because this dish has beef, but the one tasting best is beef head skin, or the offal indeed is better. Offal was disdained by those even slightly elegant people in the past. This dish with such a name is not related to the beef lungs. 80 years ago, a poor couple in Chengdu, Mr. and Mrs. Guo, to make a living, took the beef offal, such as beef head skin, beef heart, beef tongue, and beef tripe to make a snack delicately and they sold it in a basket on the street. The ingredient was offal, which meant waste in the past, so naturally, it was called “Beef Wastes.”

The Guo couple sliced the delicately marinated beef heart, beef tongue, beef tripe, and beef head skin, together with slight beef, and mixed them with the chili sauce, wild people powder and other spices. This soft, spicy, and fresh dish became popular among civilians, and even then some clerks came to taste. And then those wealthy and posted people also liked it but it seemed that the “Beef Wastes” sounded not elegant, so it was changed to the “Beef Lungs” (“waste” and “lung” have the same pronunciation as their Chinese characters). Over the 80 years, Couple’s Beef Lungs in Chili Sauce which was sold once in a basket on the street has been served in the restaurant, becoming one of the famous Chengdu snacks.

How to cook the Sliced Beef and Ox Tongue in Chili Sauce

The materials need a beef tongue, beef heart, and beef ham. Washing the beef tongue and heart in a pot, and boils the beef in another separate pot, to prevent the mixture of offal and beef. There are about 24 spices like the fennel and wild pepper and so on. The heat control of the marinating is very critical.

First, boil up the pot with a strong fire, and simmer with soft wire. If insufficiently boiled with fire, offal and beef cannot be chewed. If boiled too much, offal and beef will become loose. The marinated beef and offal should be sliced so that it can taste better. Beef tripe is wafer-thin. If you put it on a piece of paper, through the tripe, you can still see the words.

The recoil is the soul of the Couple’s Beef lungs. The refining of the red oil is very particular. After the oil is boiled, pours the caraway and other seasonings prepared in advance into the oil pot scoops the condiments out until brown and continues heating up the oil.

Then the Couple’s Beef Lungs in Chili Sauce is done. It tastes distinctively spicy and fresh. It is a classic representative of Sichuan spicy snacks. Couple’s Beef Lungs in Chili Sauce is typical in making use of discarded things by civilians in Chengdu, even the whole Sichuan.

Long Chao-Shou (Wonton) 龙抄手 lóng chāo shǒu

In the famous Kuanzhai Alley of Chengdu, there is the local snack of Chengdu, Long Chao-shou. The food name is extraordinary. What is Chao-shou? It is called Wonton in the north, Yuntun of Baomian in the south like Guangzhou. In Sichuan, it is named Chao-shou. Why is it so-called? As it is folded into a triangle, and the two ends are folded together. It’s just like Chengdu people wrap their arms when chatting.

The history of Long Chao-Shou

Then where did the name Long Chaoshou come from? It is not because the owner’s family name is Long (dragon). At that time, there were three people who were discussing business in Nonghua Tea Garden, Chunxi Road. Nonghua Tea Garden. They were talking about the name of their business. Finally, they reached an agreement and decided to use “nong” from Nonghua Tea Garden. Nong. It is the Chinese character “nong” (thick) Chengdu people often pronounce “nong” and “long” in the same way, so the founder took the homophone of “nong,” “long”(dragon) and used in their shop name. In 1941, Long Chaoshou opened up. Chinese people are descendants of the dragon (long in Chinese). Dragon is auspicious. So they named it Long Chao-shou.

How to make the Long Chao-Shou

Long Chaoshou, with complicated making and various flavors, is one classic Chengdu snack. Before the dough mixing, a few eggs are added first, to improve the dough tenacity. In order to keep the dough rigidity, a small amount of water is added first, and gradually, according to hand feeling, add a small amount of water each time, and after mixing, the rolling of wrappers should be started as soon as possible, or otherwise, the dough will become soft, which is hard to be rolled out.

As the dough is hard, it’s difficult to roll. With repeated rolling and pressing, a lump of dough gradually became a thin roller. With repeated rolling and pressing, a chunk of dough is finally rolled out into a piece of a large wrapper 0.5 m wide and 4 m long, which is like an Xuan paper scroll when unfolded. The rolled wrapper is cut into squares of the palm-size. Every ten squares constitute a group, with the primarily equal weight. 100 grams.

Mince the pork ham with 30％ of fat and 70％ of lean meat, add salt, ginger juice, and ground pepper, and mix them while adding water until they become viscous. Put some stuffing on the square wrapper. Smear, fold and pinch, and a Chao-shou are made in a minute. It looks like the swallowtail and shape of crossing arms (Chao-shou in Sichuan dialect). That’s why Sichuan people call it Chao-shou.

Since Long Chao-shou has only one kind of stuffing, its rich flavor is attributed to the soup. Chicken makes the soup refreshing, duck makes the soup savory, pork leg makes the soup thick, and pork tripe makes the soup white. Those are the four critical elements in making the soup. Quick-boil the bones, chicken, duck, and pork leg in the water to get rid of their smell. Then put them is the cauldron mainly used to make soup, together with a seasoning packet which includes dozens of condiments. After being boiled for six hours, the soup turns into white. Then scoop out the thick soup and filter out the dregs. The original Long Chaoshou soup is thus made. By the soup, several different flavors such as spicy, sour and hot flavors, seafood flavor and special multi-flavor are developed according to people’s tastes.

Other 5 Chengdu snacks

4 Spicy crayfish 麻辣小龙虾 má là xiǎo lóng xiā

There are also a lot of weird local snacks, such as spicy crayfish (look like tiny crayfish Spicy hot crayfish is a delicious dish that is very popular in China. It is a combination of crayfish set in a spicy and chili sauce. It is both spicy and hot. It is famous for its flavor. When it is sold in the street, which will soon be enclosed. Even every restaurant sells this dish, and the business is everywhere.

5 The red oil rabbit slice 红油兔丁 hóng yóu tù dīng

Choose the first-class and white rabbit, and then chop the rabbit meat to be 1.5 CM (centimeter) square, then adjust the right amount of soybean sauce, refined sugar, wild pepper powder, the red pepper oil, then puts the rabbit slices into the pan. The rich dish would be decorated with spring onion and some shelled peanut. The tender rabbit meat is tremendously delicate and tasty because of the fresh meat and bright red chili oil, and its spiciness is right.

6 Good smell stick (a kind of hot pot) 串串香 chuàn chuàn xiāng

It is a kind of spicy hot snack in China, somewhat like a hot pot. Sliced raw meats, edible offals (entrails and internal organs), and vegetables are impaled on bamboo skewers, and people should dip them into a pan with boiling spicy soup mounted above a heating device.   

7 Sichuan noodles with peppery sauce 担担面 dān dān miàn

It is a classic dish originating from Chinese Sichuan cuisine. It consists of a spicy sauce containing preserved vegetables (often including Zha can, 榨菜, the hot pickled mustard tuber), chili oil, Sichuan pepper, minced pork, and scallions served over noodles.

Sesame paste is sometimes added and sometimes replaces the spicy sauce. Dandan noodle is considered as a variation of Ma Jiang noodle (麻酱面, sesame sauce noodles). It is often sweeter, less spicy, and less soupy, and peanut butter is sometimes added.

8 Sad Bean Jelly 伤心凉粉 shāng xīn liáng fěn

This bean jelly made by grinding different grains, such as rice and soybean, is one of the most popular snacks for Chengdu residents. The mixture of bean jelly with chili oil, preserved pickle, coriander herb, and other spices makes the bean jelly taste hot and spicy but delicious. At Luodai, Sad Bean Jelly is famous for the chili mixed with it – a kind of local chili that tastes "terribly" hot. It is hot enough to make the eater "sad" to the point of tears but also so satisfied that the average spiciness-hunter will always come back for more. Typically, even though their red face is streaming with tears, they are still unwilling to stop eating.

There are varieties of Sad Bean Jelly – cold or warm, black, yellow or white – made from different materials. The appearance alone can whet your appetite. If you are not accustomed to very hot food but still want to have to take the challenge, you'd better buy a dessert called "Guiling Jelly" which is immersed in brown sugar. It not only perfectly compliments the Sad Bean Jelly but can also be a "straw to clutch at" when battling with the intense spiciness.

Leisure city - Chengdu

You will feel very comfortable living in Chengdu. With rich natural resources, various condiments and easy and comfortable life, Chengdu people have conditions and time to study delicious food. Sichuan people have two major natural instincts: eating and playing. 

They care about how to live a comfortable life, and to make life easy. Even they are poor; they find ways to be happy. So many vibrant and colorful snacks are created. From steamed, boiled, roast, baked, stir-fried with fried food, there are over 200 varieties of snacks in Chengdu. Sandapao, Long Chaoshou, Spicy Bean Jelly, Tasty pork ear slice, Couple's Beef Lungs in Chili Sauce, Spicy crayfish, Chuan Chuan Xiang, Dandanmian, etc. They make people mouth water just by listening to their names. Chengdu people who love and know food can always draw on local resources and create something out of nothing, creating wide variety of snacks.