Linyi Sauce-Pickled Yugua 临猗酱玉瓜

Linyi Sauce-Pickled Yugua (临猗酱玉瓜) is a pickle of melon cured in sauce from Linjin town (临晋镇) in Linyi County (临猗县), Yuncheng (运城), in southern Shanxi. The Yuncheng city government treats its handmade production as a craft of south Shanxi pickle-making and dates the traditional method to the Ming and Qing dynasties.

How it is made

A county gazetteer of Linjin from 1923, quoted by the Yuncheng government, describes yugua as pickling melon (菜瓜) cured in sauce before it is ripe. The Yuncheng government says the craft is found mainly around Linjin town, and credits local differences in temperature, water and soil with giving the pickle a standing it calls unique in China.

Flavour and texture

The pickle is described as pleasant to eat, sweet within the saltiness and strongly flavoured with sauce. A local folk verse runs that one saucer of yugua perfumes the four neighbouring houses.

Where it comes from

According to the recollections of the craftsman Xu Zhiming (许志明), the early workshops making it included two old names, Jingyitong (敬义通) and Senmaoyuan (森茂源). In the Qing dynasty Linjin's yugua was sent to the palace as tribute. At the 1915 Panama exposition in San Francisco, yugua supplied by Jingyitong won a silver award, and the pickle also received a quality-product award from the Shanxi provincial government in 1981. Production stopped for a time; the state-run Linjin food factory revived it in 1952, and in 1981 the factory became the Linjin Dongsheng Sauce Works (临晋东晟酱园), which makes the Yixiangyuan (猗香苑) brand of yugua.