Upturned Steamed Bowl Dishes 扣碗
Upturned Steamed Bowl Dishes is featured among the local specialties of Henan.
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Upturned Steamed Bowl Dishes (扣碗) are part of Anyang’s (安阳) traditional food repertoire. In Guanzhai village (观寨村), Neihuang County (内黄县), bowl-steamed dishes form the local Eight Great Bowls (八大碗), prepared for the New Year with meat and vegetable dishes cooked together in steamers.
Preparing the bowls
China National Radio describes pork belly being cut, boiled to set its shape, sliced evenly and arranged neatly in bowls before steaming. Maker Xu Liwei (徐利伟) identifies fermented-beancurd pork as the central dish: layered pork belly passes through boiling, frying, cutting and marinating before two hours in the steamer. The finished pork is described as meltingly tender.
A village assortment
For the assortment Xu presented in 2025, six meat dishes were red-braised beef, ribs, meatballs, fried pork, fish pieces and fermented-beancurd pork. Kelp and eight-treasure rice completed the eight bowls. The rice was described by a diner as sweet, soft and sticky.
China National Radio records a shift from earlier vegetable-led bowls with meat as an accompaniment towards a more meat-heavy assortment. Seasonal ingredients and local seasoning have long shaped the village’s bowl dishes.
Sources & reading
Written from the linked sources and checked sentence by sentence against quoted extracts by a separate reviewer on 2026-09-26. Recipes and servings vary between kitchens.