Xianju Eight-Bowl Banquet 仙居八大碗

What is in the eight bowls

The eight bowls come as an upper four and a lower four. According to the Shenxianju site, the upper four are lotus seeds (or white hyacinth beans), sea cucumber (or roushen, 肉参), fish maw (or pounded pork), and fanwan pork (翻碗肉, literally 'turned-bowl pork'). The lower four are bamboo shoots (or wild rice stem or dried bamboo shoots), stir-fried pork (strips of tofu fried with shredded pork, or shiitake mushrooms), mutton (or shredded cuttlefish), and a dazahui (大杂烩) of pig's stomach, intestines and tofu cut into irregular pieces.

Two dishes that the site calls typical of Xianju are served outside the eight: paoxiang (泡鲞), a dried-fish dish, and pork-skin puffs (肉皮泡). Once all the dishes are on the table, a plate of green vegetables is served to clear the palate.

How it is eaten

The banquet is laid on a square Eight Immortals table (八仙桌), about one metre on each side, with a 'four-chi bench' (四尺凳) on each side seating two, eight people in all. A full table gets the eight big bowls and sixteen to twenty-four dishes in all, known locally as 'eight large and eight fine' (八大八细).

Where it comes from

A local legend tells how the Eight Immortals, on their way back to Shenxianju after fighting the Dragon King, came down to join a wedding in the neighbouring village of Pantan (皤滩), where the richest man was marrying off his daughter, and each cooked one dish to celebrate. In the story the eight dishes carry the Immortals' names: Caihe's lotus seeds, Xiangzi's sea cucumber, Zhongli's fanwan pork, Guojiu's paoxiang, Dongbin's big fish, Tieguai's pounded pork, Xiangu's pork-skin puffs and Guolao's tofu. After that, the story goes, Xianju people called their square dining tables Eight Immortals tables and served the eight dishes at weddings.