Zhoushengji Wontons 周生记馄饨

Zhoushengji Wontons (周生记馄饨) are the large pork wontons of the Zhoushengji (周生记) shop in Huzhou (湖州), one of the city's "four famous snacks" (四大名点). Zhejiang Online names them, with the Ding Lianfang (丁莲芳) tofu-skin parcels, as the two long-established snacks no talk of Huzhou food can skip.

Ingredients

The filling includes choice pork from the shoulder cut known as jiaxin rou (夹心肉), bamboo-shoot sheaths (笋衣) and black sesame. Zhejiang Online reports that the founder launched them as "the only traditional large wonton of fresh pork and bamboo-shoot sheath in Huzhou", and that the wontons are shaped much like a yuanbao (元宝), the old boat-shaped ingot.

Flavour and texture

Both Zhejiang Online and a Lianyi Bao (联谊报) report carried by Tide News (潮新闻) quote the same four-part description: a thin, smooth wrapper, a large and full filling, plenty of juice in the mouth, and a fresh taste that lingers. Lianyi Bao adds that the wontons are still wrapped by hand every day.

Where it comes from

Zhejiang Online says Zhou Jixiang (周济相) founded the business in the early 20th century and borrowed ideas from the older Ding Lianfang parcels. Lianyi Bao traces it to a small wonton shop of 1940 that grew into a China Time-honored Brand (中华老字号), and reports that its wonton-making skill is on Zhejiang's provincial intangible cultural heritage list. Huzhou has a custom of eating wontons on the sixth day of the sixth lunar month (六月六). A two-storey Zhoushengji shop stands on Yishang Street (衣裳街) in Wuxing (吴兴) district, an old street that the Zhejiang Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Association named in its first batch of provincial intangible-heritage theme districts.