Chengliu Razor Clams 蛏熘

Chengliu Razor Clams (蛏熘) is a soup of starch-coated razor clams from Putian (莆田), Fujian. At the 2025 Duotou razor clam festival in Hanjiang District (涵江区), Fujian Daily listed Putian-style chengliu soup mixed with rice noodles among the classic razor clam dishes laid out for guests.

How it is made

The dish is named for liu (熘), which a Guangzhou Daily (广州日报) food feature calls a cooking method particular to Fujian: the clam meat is coated in pure sweet potato starch, which keeps it crisp and tender, seasoned with a little white vinegar and pepper, and then cooked in boiling soup. The feature calls the dish farmhouse razor clam liu soup (农家蛏溜汤), writing liu with a variant character.

Flavour and texture

The vinegar and pepper give the broth a sour, slightly peppery savour. The same feature sets it against Fujian's red mushroom and razor clam soup: that one is drunk for its delicate flavour, chengliu for a more punchy bowl.

Ingredients

Hanjiang's own speciality is the Duotou razor clam (哆头蛏), the constricted tagelus (缢蛏), raised on the black mudflats of Sanjiangkou town (三江口镇) in Hanjiang. Villagers sow the young clams by hand each winter and dig the grown ones by hand the next spring and summer, so the mud stays free of machine oil. Fujian Daily dates Duotou village's clam raising to the Ming dynasty, and in 2018 'Putian constricted tagelus' (莆田缢蛏) gained national geographical-indication status. During Hanjiang's 2025 Duotou razor clam food season, the 'hundred razor clam banquet' (百蛏宴) that Putian chefs created for it included chengliu soup.

How it is eaten

Besides the festival bowls with rice noodles, chengliu also comes as a set meal: in spring 2025 Fujian Daily reported a 70-year-old Hanjiang resident collecting a free chengliu set meal with a supply cooperative meal voucher for older people.