This was the first thing I ever ate in what was to become my future home city. It was 1997 and I was visiting Liuzhou from Hunan Province, where I then lived. The person I was visiting took me for dinner in the hotel I now live next door to all these years later. I moved in 1999.
On the table as we sat down was a plate of what looked to me like small, strangely shaped, bifurcated bits of gristle and a bowl of dipping sauce consisting of soy sauce and chilli peppers. Something to munch on as we contemplated the menu. I tentatively reached for a lump of gristle, duly dipped it and slipped it into my mouth. All I tasted at first was the dip, but gradually the flavour of what was dipped came through. A sort of intense duck flavour. The thing was crisp on the outside, but had a creamy mouthfeel on the inside and was oh so tasty.
Fried Duck Tongues
What I was holding was a deep fried duck tongue 鸭舌 (yā shé). Like most people, I guess, I had never considered whether ducks had tongues or not. I now know they do, but their tongues are not like ours; they have no taste buds. The tongues are merely used to manoeuvrer food into the right position to slip down their gullets. I know people who eat like that, too.
Duck tongues are a hugely popular snack or beer food in China; less so elsewhere, it seems. There are two main ways to prepare them here: the first being a Cantonese preparation where they are shallow fried and finished with soy sauce, rice wine and sugar, the second with more of a Hunan influence sees the tongues deep fried and sprinkled with chilli flakes and cumin. I like both, but my preference falls to the latter.
Cantonese cooks also steam the tongues with ginger and rice wine. For some unknown reason, these are never seasoned and for known reasons sorely need to be. I avoid those.
There is a recipe of sorts here for spicy duck tongues which is very similar to how I prepare them. Ignore the TCN (Traditional Chinese Nonsense) advice about these being a “cold” food and eating them not provoking anger!
I only get angry when they run out!
Advertising for industrially produced duck tongues
Ready to eat tongues are often sold on supermarket deli counters and there are industrially cooked and packaged versions in convenience stores, but the raw tongues are seldom seen in regular stores. I get them from the local wet market. In the west, I’d be looking in Asian markets or online. They are sold frozen in London’s Chinatown, I know.
Finally, here is another recipe from my collection of Chinese language books.
河虾芦笋鸭舌 (hé xiā lú sǔn yā shé)
River Shrimp, Asparagus and Duck Tongues
100 gram river shrimp
100 g asparagus
80 g duck tongues
soy sauce, salt, vinegar
Wash the shrimp, asparagus and tongues.
Boil the tongues in salted, boiling water and drain. Reserve.
Steam shrimp until done.
Blanch asparagus and drain.
Dress to taste with light soy sauce and vinegar. Serve.
Again, no indication of how long to boil the tongues. Some other recipes recommend up to 30 minutes, but that seems excessive to me. But then I never boil them; always fry.
