Shaxian Snacks 沙县小吃

Shaxian Snacks (沙县小吃) is the collective name for a family of small dishes from Sha County (沙县), now Shaxian District of Sanming (三明) in Fujian. The snacks belong to Fujian cuisine (闽菜). In 2021 the Shaxian snack-making technique entered the fifth national list of intangible cultural heritage, put forward by Sanming.

Where it comes from

The national heritage listing traces the techniques to people from the Central Plains (中原) who migrated into the Baiyue (百越) lands of the south, so the snacks mix northern and southern food habits. Sha County lies in central Fujian and was historically a crossing point for north-south and east-west traffic; to serve merchants and travellers, its snacks settled on being economical, varied and quick. According to the gazetteer Bamin Tongzhi (八闽通志), they rose in the Tang and Song dynasties and flourished under the Ming and Qing. The craft is also practised in Yong'an (永安), Mingxi (明溪), Qingliu (清流) and Ninghua (宁化), but is most concentrated in Sha County. Chinese Wikipedia describes the cooking as based mainly on Fuzhou (福州) cuisine, with southern Fujian traits and the style of the Hakka of Tingzhou (汀州).

Ingredients

Most ingredients are local and mainly plant-based: bamboo fungus (竹荪), taro (香芋) and tea-tree mushrooms (茶树菇), with chicken, duck, beef and mutton in a supporting role. The main seasonings are Shaxian chilli sauce (沙县纯辣酱), fermented black bean oil (豆豉油), Maoxi winter wine (茂溪冬酒) and peanut sauce.

How it is made

Cooks combine soaking, pounding, grinding, kneading, sun-drying, wrapping and stuffing with steaming, boiling, roasting, pan-frying, griddle-baking and stewing, using wooden mallets, mortars and pestles, wooden rice steamers, steamer baskets and griddle pans. The result is more than 110 kinds of snack, among them Shaxian bianrou (扁肉, wontons), stuffed tofu balls (包心豆腐丸), Shaxian xiguo (喜粿), mi dong pi (米冻皮) and pressed duck (板鸭). Over 90 percent of them can be prepared in advance or made within a few minutes.

How it is eaten

In shops run by people from Sha County, the standard 'old four' (老四样) are bianrou, mixed noodles (拌面), stewed soup in small crocks (炖罐) and steamed dumplings (蒸饺). Many shops under the Shaxian Snacks sign across China also add local dishes that have nothing to do with Sha County, such as rice with a topping (盖浇饭), popular in the north, or Cantonese fried rice noodles (炒河粉). According to Chinese Wikipedia, the first shop under that name was opened in Xiamen (厦门) by Deng Shiqi (邓世奇) and his wife, snack-shop owners who left Sha County after a local rotating credit scheme (标会) collapsed in 1992.