How Many of These Autumn Delicacies of Nanjing Have you Tried?

When the autumn breeze has painted the leaves golden, the avenues lined with plane trees have reached their most beautiful time of the year, bringing the charm of the season all over the Nanjing city. At the same time, the golden osmanthus also starts to bloom, enchanting Nanjing throughout the season. Along with the osmanthus fragrance floating all over the city, the numerous delicacies related to osmanthus will make your mouth water.

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» Sweet Osmanthus Taro

The sweet osmanthus taro made with mini taro is known for its smooth taste. After the taros are boiled, they blend well in the sweet lotus root starch. Each bite will melt in your mouth, smooth and creamy. The lotus root starch, added as one of the ingredients, will make this dish thick, delicious and refreshing, leaving the heavenly fragrance between your lips and teeth.

» Sweet-scented Osmanthus Lotus Root

The sliced lotus root is stuffed with glutinous rice and stewed with sweet-scented osmanthus sauce, red dates, and brown sugar until the lotus root is softened. When the softened lotus clashes with the glutinous rice soaked with lotus fragrance and sweetness, it will be a dance of tastes in your mouth.

» Osmanthus Cake

Osmanthus cake is from a traditional Chinese pastry recipe. It is only made with glutinous rice flour, sugar, and sweet-scented osmanthus honey. After being steamed, cut into small pieces, and dipped in sweet-scented osmanthus honey, the crystal cake looks like jelly, chewy in the mouth. It is a heavenly dessert with a good pot of tea in the morning or afternoon.

» Plum Blossom Cake

Compared to osmanthus cake, the plum blossom cake has more possible ingredients. When little rice balls, mixed dried fruits, pine nuts, and mashed red beans are stirred in the cake mix and baked in a special oven, it provides a smooth taste, crispy outside but soft inside. Although there is no sweet-scented osmanthus in the plum blossom cake, it is known as one of “the four most loveable street snacks in Nanjing”, along with sweet osmanthus taro, red bean stuffed rice balls in rice wine broth, and sweet osmanthus lotus root. Visitors to Nanjing should definitely try this delicacy.

Among the thousands of kinds of seasonal food in autumn, crabs are inevitably one of them. When the verse “as the autumn breeze rises” starts, the latter half, “the crab legs itch” (meaning it’s the best season to eat crabs), will be pronounced. After the Mid-autumn Festival, it is the time when the Gucheng Lake crabs are the fattest and most delicious.

» Gucheng Lake Crabs

Gucheng Lake is known for its rich water and vegetation and pleasant climate. Here grows the hairy crabs with green backs, white bellies, yellow hair, and golden claws. The crab meat is full and sweet, with the males full of crab mustard and the females full of roe. Nothing else would match the delight and joy to pour a glass of sweet osmanthus wine for such delicacies, and toast towards the moon for a lovely night.

When wandering on the streets of Nanjing, people may realize that the fragrance of osmanthus always come with a sweet scent. It penetrates the nostrils and swirls around the tongue tips before reaching the stomachs, bringing sweetness to people’s hearts. But sometimes, osmanthus is used as decorations in dishes or appear only in the names of dishes.

» Osmanthus Duck

In autumn, Nanjing, the place showing a particular preference for ducks in its cuisine, welcomes the delicious osmanthus duck. One may easily misunderstand the ingredients of the dish, because the name does not suggest that it is the salted duck made in the blooming season of osmanthus. The dish boasts of its best colors and tastes, with white skin and pink meat with a thin layer of fat in between. But, as you are putting a piece of the duck in your mouth when the autumn breeze starts, you may really feel the taste of the fragrant osmanthus.

» Roast Duck Buns

Regarding ducks in Nanjing, only roast duck is comparable with salted duck. However, if a roast duck is not special enough, what about the steamed mini buns (xiaolongbao) stuffed with roast duck? When you bite through the thin and crusty wrapper, the tender roast duck and pork mince with rich juice inside is tasty beyond imagination. It is a taste that you can never find elsewhere.

*Recommended restaurant: Special delicacy offered by Nanjing Impressions (Nanjing Dapaidang). Be sure to go to the right place.

» Duck Blood and Vermicelli Soup

After enjoying the duck meat, the duck carcass is used to boil the broth. Such a bowl of soup with duck blood, duck intestines, duck liver, duck gizzard, oily tofu, and vermicelli is the hometown taste branded in the Nanjing people’s memories.

The history of over one thousand years has witnessed the development and inheritance of the delicacies in Nanjing, which has more than a hundred varieties nowadays. What is covered here in this essay is merely a corner of an iceberg. So what are the Nanjing delicacies you have heard of or eaten? Let us know in the comment. You can also participate in the lucky draw by leaving comments and sharing this post.