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Pingyao Top 9 Foods

The ancient streets of Pingyao hide delicious foods that have nourished the taste buds of merchants, scholars, and travelers for hundreds of years. From imperial banquet dishes to simple street snacks, these nine representative foods tell the story of the inheritance of Shanxi's food culture.

Pingyao Beef (Intangible Cultural Heritage Technique)

This cold-smoking technique originated in the Western Han Dynasty. It uses the tendon meat of Jinan Yellow Cattle. After it is marinated with "five kinds of salt and eight spices", it will be smoked for seven days in the smoke of pine and cypress wood. The beef shows a deep red color like amber, and salt crystals can be seen between the muscle fibers.

Recommendation: Guanyun Beef.

Tips: You can also watch a national-level intangible cultural heritage inheritor demonstrate meat-cutting techniques on-site.

Pingyao Wan Tuo

Pingyao Wan Tuo is a thin, round pancake made from buckwheat batter. It is eaten with a sauce prepared from mature vinegar, chili oil, and minced garlic. The cutting method is particular. It is cut into fine cross-hatch patterns, but the bottom of the Wan Tuo is not cut through. When lifted with a bamboo skewer, it looks like a lotus flower.

Recommendation: Dongji.

Tips: It have special stir-fried bowl-tu

Daoxiaomian

Daoxiaomian is a noodle cut by a skilled chef. Daoxiaomian is thick in the middle, thin in the edge, angular and shaped like a willow leaf. They are smooth outside, chewy inside, soft but not sticky. The more you chew, the better it tastes. Served with a mix of sauce and aged vinegar, it has a distinctive flavor and is widely popular in northern China. There is a saying that the face of the world is in China, the face of China is in Shanxi and the face of Shanxi is Pingyao.

Recommendation: Tian Yuan Kui Restaurant.

Tips: Suggested to dip with ten-year-old aged vinegar.

Youcha

Shanxi Youcha, a classic among the traditional healthy foods of the Shanxi merchants, has a history of over a thousand years in Pingyao. People make this delicious treat by first stir-frying flour and then adding different kinds of ingredients. Once brewed with hot water, it turns into a thick paste. At the start, wealthy merchants were the ones who got to enjoy this delicacy. But as time went on, it gradually changed and became a nutritious and healthy drink that ordinary folks really like.

Recommendation: Yongxinghe Hotel

Huangmi Liang Gao

Huangmi Liang Gao is made from Huangmi (Chinese sticky millet), a speciality of the northern Jinbei region of China, mixed with sea buckthorn and jujube nectar, kneaded into a dough and steamed, with a fluffy corn exterior, a sweet and sour sea buckthorn sauce in the middle, and sweet jujube paste as the base, giving it a rich flavour.

Recommendation: Yi Mian Yi Cu Restaurant.

Pingyao Copper Hot Pot

A Pingyao copper hot pot has three parts: pot body, chimney and charcoal fire basin. The round pot body holds ingredients and soup. The middle chimney helps with air flow, making charcoal burn well and releasing heat. The charcoal fire basin under the pot holds charcoal for heat. A Pingyao copper hot pot often uses chicken or bone soup as base. After long boiling, the soup is rich, tasty and nutritious. Some add Chinese herbs like Codonopsis and wolfberries for more nutrition.

Recommendation: Lao Zhaojia Shanxi Copper Hot Pot

Eggs in Aged Vinegar

This dish mixes the tenderness of eggs with the rich flavor of Pingyao aged vinegar. The eggs have soaked up the sweet and sour taste of the vinegar. They taste sour, fragrant and appetizing when eaten, with a rich flavor. The vinegar's sourness gets rid of the eggs' fishy smell and adds a special flavor. So, this dish is great for whetting your appetite and going with rice. The soup is thick. It's also nice to mix it with rice or use it for dipping steamed buns.

Recommendation: Xinyi Jiu Hotel

Youmian Kaolaolao

Youmian Kaolaolao, a traditional Shanxi noodle dish shaped like a honeycomb, carries the farming wisdom of the Loess Plateau and the thousand-year footsteps of the Jin merchants' camel caravans. It is made by rolling oat noodles into honeycomb-shaped rolls and steaming them, and dipping them in mutton bacon or pickled vegetables and tofu marinade. The best way to eat it is to tear open the roll, let the holes soak up the soup, and then eat it in one bite.

Recommendation: Hongwuji Restaurant.

Tips: Daily 10:00 AM demonstration of the roll rolling technique of the provincial non-genetic inheritance.

Pingyao Sweet and Sour Meatballs

People in Pingyao are known for their love of vinegar, and sweet and sour meatballs are a typical example of Pingyao's vinegar-inspired cuisine. The sweet and sour meatballs are made from the front leg of the Jinnan black pig, which is of suitable fatness and leanness, minced by hand and made into meatballs, which are then deep-fried in oil with a sweet and sour sauce boiled in advance. It is rich in flavour, with a crispy sugar coating on the outside and sweet and sour meatballs doused with sweet and sour sauce on the inside.

Recommendation: Hongwuji Restaurant

By Kristen Qin
Web Editor

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