Yuanling Sun-Dried Pork 沅陵晒兰肉
Yuanling Sun-Dried Pork is featured among the local specialties of Hunan.
Yuanling Sun-Dried Pork (沅陵晒兰肉), also called simply shailan (晒兰), is lean pork cut into paper-thin slices, cured with salt, Sichuan pepper and rice wine, and dried until each slice stands up stiff and turns reddish brown. It comes from Yuanling County (沅陵县) in Huaihua (怀化), western Hunan, where the Yuan River (沅江) and the You River (酉水) run through the county.
How it is made
The Huaihua city government describes more than ten steps, with hand-made shailan rated highest. Fine lean meat from the hind leg is trimmed and opened out into slices as thin as tissue paper, rubbed with a measured mix of seven seasonings including salt, Sichuan pepper and rice wine, and cured in a crock. The slices are then spread on an iron rack over smokeless charcoal until dry, stiff and reddish brown: this is raw shailan. Frying it in vegetable oil until the meat turns deep red gives cooked shailan.
The Huaihua government says that shailan is not in fact sun-dried, while the Yuanling county government allows both methods: the cured slices are laid in bamboo baskets in the sun outdoors, or dried over smokeless charcoal at about 65°C. It names the leg, back and tenderloin of the local western Hunan black pig as the cuts used.
How it is eaten
Shailan can be stir-fried, steamed or deep-fried. Cooks usually cut it into thin strips or carve it into duckweed-leaf or orchid shapes, then toss it in the wok with spring onion and chopped chilli; cooked shailan can also be eaten without this step. Seasoned further, it becomes five-spice, sweet-and-sour or numbing-hot shailan snacks. The Huaihua government describes the result as crisp, fragrant, sweet, salty and hot at once. Because it keeps well, it is also given as a gift to relatives and friends.
Where it comes from
The Huaihua government dates shailan to the Ming and Qing dynasties, nearly 300 years ago, saying it came from Jiangxi (江西) to Chenzhou (辰州), today's Yuanling county town. A local story told by New Hunan (新湖南) credits the wives of Yuan River raftsmen, who cured lean hind-leg pork from Daheping (大合坪) black mountain pigs with salt and rice wine and hung it in bamboo baskets at the bow to dry, so their husbands had food that would not spoil on the water. The making technique is a Huaihua municipal intangible cultural heritage item.
Sources & reading
Written from the linked sources and checked sentence by sentence against quoted extracts by a separate reviewer on 2026-09-24. Recipes and servings vary between kitchens.