Meizhou Eats: Eating a whole salt-baked chicken (盐焗鸡), at its origin

Salt-baked chicken, or yan ju chicken (盐焗鸡), is one of the Hakka dishes that has become well-known as it’s spread all over the world. So, being in Meizhou 梅州, the so-called world capital of Hakka, I wanted to try salt-baked chicken at its source!

I had read a story about some Hakka people lacking cooking utensils, but did have salt, and so they tried preparing the chicken baked in the salt. The ever-reliable Woks of Life has a much richer story (and recipe!) on their blog, so I’ll just link that here.

I decided to have my salt-baked chicken here, at a restaurant called Three Sisters Old Home 三妹老屋。Underneath it says “fresh salt-baked chicken,” because they bake every chicken to order!

That means that after ordering, one has to wait some time before it comes out, as opposed to other restaurants where the dish can come out immediately. Here, a whole chicken runs 80 RMB (US$11.25 with the ever-strengthening dollar).

I browsed the Dazhong Dianping 大众点评 to find this place, and I think many other domestic tourists did too, because the others in the dining room were speaking either standard Mandarin 普通话 or a dialect other than Hakka. Some even had suitcases with them, as if they had just arrived or were about to go on to their next destination.

I ordered a plate of lettuce with oyster sauce (蚝油生菜), just to have some vegetables along with my entire chicken! It was very tasty, and much less oily than the version I had the night before. But in terms of conserving stomach space, this turned out to be somewhat of a mistake, as I would find out later.

About 40 minutes after arriving at the restaurant and placing my order, the salt-baked chicken came out! So perfectly golden.

And with the head and toenails still on. Reminds me of the chickens we received in our government rations during lockdown! You can see the flavorful juices accumulating at the bottom.

I put on disposable gloves and dig in with my hands. This chicken was truly excellent. Nicely salted (maybe too salty for others?) and moist yet with a firm textured. Nothing spongy here.

So I was proud of myself for finishing the whole chicken, but both the waitress and boss guy asked me if I wanted “cooked rice noodles” (煮粉). It was only 10 RMB, or about US$1.50, for a small portion. I looked around and everyone was getting this, so I said yes.

After some time, the boss guy came out with a pot, and started pouring into my now empty tureen, save for the juices at the bottom.

“Small” portion, really!?

There was some morning glory vegetables (空心菜), and chicken offal. So I had ordered the lettuce earlier to have vegetables, but here were more vegetables, and I just wasn’t able to finish the offal or noodles due to lack of stomach space. I did eat all of the small blood-looking pieces, but after one of the livers I really couldn’t stand another because of the taste. I did drink the flavorful soup until the last spoonful!