This morning, in a local supermarket, I found this pile of dirty little ball-shaped things.
Eleocharis dulcis
In Chinese, 马蹄/馬蹄 (Mand: mǎ tí; Cant: maa5 tai4), literally 'horse hoof' or 荸荠/荸薺 ( (Mand: bí qí; Cant: but6 cai4).
Chinese water chestnuts.
Cleaned up, they look like this.
Despite their their nutty name, they are not nuts, but a root vegetable. More technically a corm.
They are eaten in many ways. They can be ground to make a type of flour used in sweet dim sum cakes. They can be candied. They are used in hot pots and stews.
They are not something I buy a lot and when I do I buy them from the farmers' market, where a couple of women sit peeling them all day long. They do it 100 times faster than I ever could.
They have the benefit of staying slightly sweet and crisp even after cooking or canning. I don't recall seeing them canned here - only fresh.
