Yunyang Paper-Thin Walnut Rice Cake 云阳桃片糕

How it is made

The county's process list for the Ruilanzhai (瑞兰斋) cake starts with top-grade glutinous rice, which is selected, sieved, washed and roasted, exposed to the night dew and spread on the ground to 'sweat', then milled, combined with sugar, rubbed and mixed, steamed, simmered and sliced.

The Chongqing Municipal Archives describe how the town's confectionery shops changed the old home method in the Ming and Qing dynasties. They spread the rice on the ground to draw moisture instead of leaving it in the night dew, steamed and simmered the cake in tin boxes over a small stove instead of steaming it in wooden boxes, and worked in maltose and walnut kernels. Every slice was cut by hand until 1965, when a manager designed a hand-cranked semi-automatic cutting machine.

Flavour and texture

A Ruilanzhai slice is a rectangle about 95 mm long, 25 mm wide and 1 mm thick. A silvery-white strip of glutinous rice about 5 mm wide runs down each side, and the pale yellow middle band, about 15 mm wide, is set with walnut kernels or other fillings. The Chongqing Local Chronicles Office describes the cake as soft and sweet, with a clear fragrance and moderate sweetness; it melts easily in the mouth and does not stick to the teeth. According to the office, a slice can be spread out flat, rolled up and set alight, and is "白如玉" (white as jade).

Sweet is the main flavour. The Ruilanzhai and Wangdahan (王大汉) lines come in five flavours: sweet, salt-and-pepper (椒盐), black rice, fruit and honey mandarin. The listed ingredients include walnut kernels, black rice, sesame, candied fruit and glutinous rice.

Where it comes from

The county traces the cake to the high Tang, when it was a home-made glutinous-rice cake (糯米糕) that was not sold in markets. A local story says the poet Du Fu (杜甫), who came down the river to live at Yun'an (云安, today's Yunyang) in 765, recovered from a stomach illness after eating it. It flourished in the Ming and Qing dynasties as jade-belt cake (玉带糕); the name 'walnut slices' (桃片) came from the walnut kernels and the paper-thin cut. In 1908 the county town had 18 confectionery shops, and during the war against Japan, merchants and refugees from downriver pushed output of the cake to about 600 jin (300 kg) a day and spread its name along the lower Yangtze.

At the turn of the Ming and Qing the Yunyang merchant Song Ruilan (宋瑞兰) created a new version of the cake, and the Ruilanzhai shop that bears his name is described by the chronicles office as the only time-honoured shop name in Yunyang County handed down for more than 400 years. Its recipe passed to the apprentice Wang Longgui (王隆贵), nicknamed Wang Dahan, whose nickname was registered as a second brand in 1991. The Ruilanzhai making technique entered the Chongqing municipal intangible cultural heritage list in September 2009, and the Ministry of Commerce named Ruilanzhai a China Time-honoured Brand (中华老字号) in June 2011.

More dishes to compare

Explore related local specialties and compare their names, preparation notes and ordering guidance.