Xinchang Stir-Fried Rice Cakes 新昌炒年糕
Xinchang Stir-Fried Rice Cakes is featured among the local specialties of Zhejiang.
Xinchang Stir-Fried Rice Cakes (新昌炒年糕) are the rice-cake dish of Xinchang County (新昌县) in Shaoxing (绍兴), Zhejiang. The cakes are stir-fried and then simmered in plenty of liquid, so the dish reaches the table with broth. In October 2023 Tide News (潮新闻) reported that the Zhejiang Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs had put the dish on its second list of 100 notable local specialities.
How it is made
Tide News says Xinchang rice cakes are made mostly from japonica (late) rice and are finer-textured and more resilient than other rice cakes. China News Service's Zhejiang edition describes high-mountain japonica rice soaked in clean water for three to five days, drained, then pounded, milled, steamed, pounded again and pressed.
For the stir-fry, the cakes are cut into strips rather than the slices used by roadside stalls. They are fried with winter bamboo shoots, pork, carrot and mushrooms, then simmered until the liquid thickens and bubbles. A Xinchang rice-cake shop owner quoted by China Xiaokang Net (中国小康网) describes adding a lot of water after frying, bringing it to the boil on high heat, and serving the cakes with smooth tofu and seasonal ingredients.
Flavour and texture
Because the cakes cook in the broth, they soak it up yet do not turn mushy with long cooking. Tide News describes the flavour as the mellow taste of rice cake combined with whatever ingredients go into the pan, so versions differ. The same shop owner calls the cakes chewy, growing more fragrant the longer they are chewed. Shredded egg and garlic leaves go on top.
Where it comes from
Xinchang was part of the ancient Shan County (剡县) of Kuaiji (会稽). China Xiaokang Net explains that water-powered trip hammers were built in large numbers along the fast-flowing upper Shan River (剡溪); these were the main equipment for making rice cakes, and by the Ming and Qing dynasties rice cakes were a New Year necessity in Xinchang. The dish was named one of Zhejiang's ten farmhouse specialty snacks in 2017, and in 2020 "Xinchang Stir-Fried Rice Cakes" was registered as a collective trademark. The county government has held stir-fried rice-cake skills contests, trained more than a thousand cooks, and developed model shops that follow shared standards for method, ingredients and premises.
Sources & reading
Written from the linked sources and fact-checked against them on 2026-09-25. Recipes and servings vary between kitchens.
Image credits & notes (1)
- Xin chang chao nian gao: stir-fried rice cake strips with leafy greens · 新昌炒年糕Photo: 三猎 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · taken 2017-04-04Resized for the web; the photo itself has not been edited. Thumbnails may show a cropped view.
