Hutu Thick-Soup Noodles 糊涂面

How it is made

The 2026 essay describes the 1980s version from a poor village in western Henan, where it was called hutu fan (糊涂饭). Water was brought to the boil and a generous amount of corn grits went in. While the grits cooked, noodles were rolled from black-soybean flour mixed with an even smaller amount of wheat flour and cut thin. When the noodles were nearly done, a bowl of chopped suan huangcai (酸黄菜, soured yellow greens) went in with a little salt. There was no oil at all, and grits and pickle outweighed the noodles.

The pickle was made from radish tops and cabbage leaves packed into a vat, weighted with a stone and covered with boiling water; in three to five days the greens turned yellow and sour.

How it is eaten

The same writer's preferred modern bowl cooks the corn grits with soaked peanuts and soybeans, adds the finest dried noodles, uses seasonal greens such as celery leaves when there is no pickle, and finishes with scallion and coriander and little salt. The writer eats it with green chilli pounded with salt in a garlic mortar, or with chilli oil, and does not object to youtiao (油条, fried dough sticks) or braised meat on the side.

Where it comes from

Chinese Wikipedia notes that the method differs from place to place and from period to period within Henan, and that in the countryside it is served at both weddings and funerals. People's Daily reported in 2020 that the Laojun Mountain (老君山) scenic area in Luoyang has served a lunch halfway up the mountain since 2017, because packed food goes cold once October arrives, and that its staple was local corn hutu noodles.