Near my home are two roughly equidistant branches of a small local chain of restaurants called 金龙砦 (jīn lóng zhài) which means “golden dragon stockade”. This chain specialises in local Guangxi food and is where I usually take first time visitors. My granddaughter ate at the branch to the south when she was two-years-old and then volunteered to help with the washing-up.
Tonight, I ordered dinner from the one to the north. Among their offerings (both menus are the same) are a number of dishes from the various local ethnic minorities’ cuisines. I chose a dish from the 瑶族 (yáo zú), Yao people, who live in Hunan, Guangxi, and Yunnan provinces as well as Vietnam where they are the người Dao and Thailand where they are the เย้า (yêā). The Yao are mainly rice farmers and have some of the worlds most spectacular rice terraces, including the famous Longji terraces here in Guangxi.
酸辣禾花鱼 (suān là hé huā yú) is literally ‘hot and sour 'grass flower' fish”. I’ve never found a real English or Latin taxonomic name for this species but they are small (10 to 12 cm / 4 to 4½ inch long) graminaceous* freshwater fish which live in the rice paddies of Guangxi.
The fish are fried whole and un-gutted then served in a broth with pickled red chillies and slivered daikon radish. The dish is neither over-spicy or over-sour but nicely balanced.
It is normally served as one of a number of dishes, but I had it alone with rice. I can only find one useful website on this dish but it’s all in Chinese. Some good images, though of both the fish and the dish.
Being a delivery dinner, mine was not attractively plated. I could have replated it and removed half of the broth, but I’m not really strong enough for even that, yet. Hopefully, next time. So, the fish were hiding underwater.
Image from 金龙砦 Jinlongzai Restaurant delivery menu
My delivery
Close up
* Of or pertaining to grass, in this case, the grass being rice.
