Kidney-Shaped Vegetable Fritters 腰子饼

Kidney-Shaped Vegetable Fritters (腰子饼) are a fried snack of Wuhu (芜湖), Anhui, shaped, as the name says, like a kidney. The Wuhu city government traces them to Sunbu town (孙埠镇) in Xuanzhou District (宣州区) of Xuancheng (宣城); Sunbu people who went to Wuhu to trade made the fritter popular there, and it came to be called Wuhu yaozi bing.

How it is made

The main ingredient is lotus root or white radish. An essay in the newspaper Wenhui Bao (文汇报) describes the fritter as it appears in the Wuhu episode of the documentary series A City, A Flavour (一城一味). A little batter goes into a small, flat steel ladle shaped like a pig's kidney. It is topped with things such as tiny dried shrimp, shredded radish and coriander, and is lowered into the oil to fry. With a turn of the ladle the fritter sets into shape.

Flavour and texture

CCTV's consumer programme Xiaofei Zhuzhang (消费主张) sums it up as crisp outside, tender inside and more fragrant the longer it is chewed.

How it is eaten

The Wenhui Bao writer thought it just the thing to eat hot, held in the hand while strolling through town. In 2022 the fritter was among the Wuhu dishes on the 200-dish list of the Anhui Department of Culture and Tourism's 'Anhui Good Flavours, Famous Snacks of a Hundred Counties' (皖美好味道·百县名小吃) campaign.