West River Fresh Catch 西江河鲜

West River Fresh Catch (西江河鲜) is the freshwater fish, shrimp and shellfish of the West River (西江, Xijiang) as eaten in Zhaoqing (肇庆). The river runs for more than 200 km through Zhaoqing, which holds most of its Guangdong section, and links Fengkai (封开), Deqing (德庆), Gaoyao (高要), Duanzhou (端州), Dinghu (鼎湖) and Sihui (四会) in what Nanfang+ calls a natural riverside food belt.

Ingredients

The catch includes river shrimp, heshun fish (和顺鱼), bream (边鱼), marble goby (笋壳鱼, 'bamboo-shoot-husk fish'), yellow catfish (黄骨丁), yellow sand clams (黄沙蚬) and river mussels. Heshun fish, nicknamed 'bent neck' (拗颈), weigh around two to three jin (one to one and a half kilograms) each and have fewer bones than bream. Marble goby has thick white flesh with very few small bones. The river shrimp are small, about the size of a finger joint, with a hard, crisp shell. The yellow sand clams, raised in the golden sand of the river, are nicknamed 'West River abalone'. Wild river mussels can be larger than an adult's palm, big enough to need two hands to hold.

How it is made

Zhaoqing cooking, also called 'West River cuisine' (西江菜), belongs to the Cantonese (Guangfu) tradition, and with river food freshness comes first. Most dishes are steamed plain or braised, which keeps the natural taste. Bream is steamed with a few black preserved olives (榄角), whose aroma soaks into the white flesh. Heshun fish is steamed and eaten dipped in a lightly salty sauce, and the mussels are steamed with minced garlic and glass noodles. Local families serve stir-fried yellow sand clams to relatives and friends.

How it is eaten

The season opens on 1 July, when the four-month fishing ban on the Pearl River basin ends and fishermen go back out on the West River; river shrimp and crabs, yellow sand clams, West River catfish, bream and marble goby then come to market. By 2019 Zhaoqing had enforced the West River fishing ban for ten years in a row, and since 2017 the West River ban period has been two months longer.