Meizhou Eats: Hakka snacks
In my couple of days in Meizhou (梅州), I had some pretty nice sit-down meals in restaurants. But I remember my snacks fondly, too.
On their old town-y street Zhongshan Road (中山路), past wholesale stores, is a stretch of snack shops. All of these following are said to be “Hakka specialties” (客家特产).
This one was pretty big, kind of like two store-fronts wide.
I spotted this bowl of fried balls: regular balls made from glutinous rice and coated in sesame seeds on the right (煎圆 jian1 yuan2), and the version flavored with mugword leaves (艾圆 ai4 yuan2) on the left.
Maybe these would have tasted better freshly fried, but I found them a bit dense and dry.
This next one was called baiqie cake (白切糕 bai2 qie1 gao1).
It comes in a block, and the staff cut it into sticks for me.
This one was a bit sweet; it was made with glutinous rice flour again, sesame seeds, and bits of green wintermelon (冬瓜糖) candy in it. Could there also have been candied orange peel in it? It had kind of a fruitcake vibe to it.
This next one was fried shredded pumpkin “discs” (炸南瓜圆).
Freshly fried!
Luckily I was able to buy just one of these because there was just too much to eat, but I could have happily had more than one - very tasty! I think these are also speckled with white sesame seeds.
In the evening, I came back to this area in search of tangyuan (汤圆, sweet glutinous rice balls in soup). One place that seemed to get really good reviews was this one, Rongji Tangyuan (荣记汤圆). The Didi driver that took me there noticed that I had inputed that store as my destination, and he said that I must be someone who enjoys snacks. So we got to talking about traveling, the pluses and minuses of traveling alone vs. in a group, the different sights of Meizhou, the politics and certain recent ill-guided development. And he also said that besides the store I was heading towards, there was another lady who made nice tangyuan too. He cautioned that Rongji Tangyuan might be closed by this time (almost 9:30pm), and to take care walking down the kind of dark alleyway as I got out.
I was happy to see an old man entering the store, but the lady holding open the door for him said that they were closed. I asked what time they opened the next day, hoping that I’d be able to catch them before my car service arrived, and she said that she was closing for good! “Too old, not going to make tangyuan anymore, apologies,” she said. I peeked inside, and the menu and prices were still up, so she really must have just closed. I congratulated her on her retirement, and went looking for another evening snack.
I walked a couple blocks back to Zhongshan Road (中山路) where I was earlier in the day; it was lit up with light strips at night…
I came across this bustling store - which turned out to be one I was looking for earlier in the day, but was closed at the time. The hours on the door say 3pm-10pm, but I think they might open a bit later. I wonder if this is also the lady making the tangyuan that my Didi driver was talking about!
I think it was maybe husband, wife, and daughter, rolling away?
They were so nice; the husband stopped his rolling to go and get a folding table for me to sit outside, because all of the other seats were occupied.
There was at least one party of diners that was brought here by a local, who said she’d been coming here since little. And one particularly loud party had a rather rude member who lifted up the lid of the boiling tangyuan without permission, just to take photos. After he left, the guy said, “so noisy (吵).” Later, after I finished, I asked if I could take pictures, and the lady said yes.
You can see the two varieties of tangyuan they make here: sesame and peanut.
The soup that the tangyuan are served in is made from hot water and a bit of this syrup or jam in the little green jar, behind the metal rod. The syrup had orange peel, the lady explained! So it had a bit of fragrance, besides sweetness.
These were special tangyuan, unlike others I’ve had. For starters, their shape differentiated one from the other: the sesame tangyuan were more spherical, while the peanut ones were more oblong.
Other sesame tangyuan I’ve had consist of a sesame paste encapsulated by a glutinous rice dough. These, on the other hand, had whole black sesame seeds distribute evenly throughout the glutinous rice dough.
Similarly, other peanut tangyuan I’ve had have a peanut paste filling. Meanwhile, these had an intact, half of a peanut enrobed in a glutinous rice dough. These were smaller than other tangyuan (besides the plain ones that consist only of glutinous rice dough), truly a (chewy) one-bite affair.
This whole bowl cost only 6 RMB (US$0.85)
Besides the delicious tangyuan, I can mention again that the people were lovely. They saw me sweating profusely; it was in the 100s during the day, still hot at night, and I was eating this hot dessert! So they adjusted the fan to give me more breeze, and even suggested to me - addressing me as “boss” (老板 laoban)! -, to move my seat. I was fine where I was, but they were just so kind.
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老字号(林)汤圆
广东省梅州市梅江区中山路119号 (Zhongshan Road No. 119, Meijiang District, Meizhou City, Guangdong Province)
