For so long as I can keep in mind, I’ve heard the identical story yearly throughout Dragon Boat Pageant. The lasting story has been handed down over centuries, every era telling it to the subsequent. Some years, a trainer on the Chinese language language faculty I dutifully attended each Sunday afternoon would move round a printout recounting the traditional allegory. Different years, my father would recount the story on the breakfast desk—earlier than all of us dug right into a plate piled excessive with sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves.
The observance of Dragon Boat Pageant, held yearly on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, is inseparable from this dish, which I grew up calling zongzi. Relying the place you’re on the planet, it goes by totally different names (together with joong and bak zhang) and will be candy or savory, made with totally different strategies and starring various fillings.
As with many holidays, actual particulars of the competition’s origins are hazy, with differing narratives colliding and coalescing over time. Essentially the most enduring rationalization of why we observe the vacation is that the competition commemorates the poet Qu Yuan, who served as an advisor within the court docket of Chu throughout China’s Warring States interval (475 – 221 BCE). When he warned the emperor in regards to the looming menace posed by the state of Qin, others within the court docket disagreed and slandered him; the emperor, perceiving disloyalty, exiled Qu Yuan. The advisor’s instincts, nevertheless, had been proper; the Chu capital was captured, and a heartbroken Qu Yuan drowned himself within the river. Native villagers paddled out onto the water in boats to seek for his physique, beating drums and splashing the water to fend off fish and evil spirits. They tossed packets of rice into the river, to feed the fish and preserve them away from Qu Yuan’s corpse. Based on folklore, these occasions helped give start to Dragon Boat Pageant traditions that keep on till today.
Regardless of the vacation’s somber origins, the time-honored customized of constructing and consuming zongzi has advanced right into a cherished (and year-round) affair. Getting ready them is a labor of affection, often a multi-day course of that features soaking the leaves in a single day, marinating the fillings for hours, and painstakingly wrapping and tying every bundle with twine. (My colleague Kat Craddock discovered how to make them from Mei Zeng, her Chinese language American good friend’s mom and a gifted house cook dinner who lives in Brooklyn.) I’ve witnessed—and took part in—the advanced course of numerous instances, as probably the most famend locations in China to take pleasure in zongzi is my mom’s hometown of Jiaxing, a metropolis in Japanese China’s Zhejiang province. Wufangzhai, arguably essentially the most well-known zongzi model within the nation, originated there, so if you happen to point out Jiaxing to anybody in China, there’s a great likelihood they’ll exclaim one thing about zongzi, even when they’ve by no means visited the town in individual. Every time my household reunites with our kinfolk in Jiaxing, zongzi is at all times our very first meal—and considered one of my favourite issues on the planet to eat.
Although I’ve a mushy spot for the zongzi from my ancestral hometown, probably the greatest issues about sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves is the range of cooking strategies, fillings, and shapes discovered throughout China and Asia, with totally different areas popularizing their very own renditions of the snack. A unifying theme—moreover being delicious—is that many varieties are strongly related to Dragon Boat Pageant. Listed below are a number of varieties to take pleasure in this yr, and a few spots the place you will get them in New York Metropolis.
Savory Cantonese
Cantonese-style sticky rice parcels usually characteristic savory components like peanuts, salted egg yolks, Chinese language sausages, pork, and mung bean, the final of which offers a creamy distinction to the gooey rice. Like with a lot Cantonese cooking, seasonings are comparatively mild, leaving room for the inherent flavors of the person components to shine. Even “the leaf releases its personal perfume,” says Sarah Leung, who writes the Chinese language meals weblog The Woks of Life together with her household. With so many alternative components wrapped up in every particular person bundle, no two bites are the identical. Search for this number of sticky rice at Mee Sum Cafe or Ho Won Bake in Manhattan’s Chinatown.
Alkaline Cantonese
Additionally emblematic of Southern China’s Cantonese delicacies is that this sweet style that requires soaking the glutinous rice in lye water, an alkaline liquid that features potassium carbonate. This step makes the rice softer and stickier and causes the kernels to tackle an amber hue as they cook dinner. “Utilizing the alkaline will launch the colour from the leaves, so it form of dyes the rice into that yellow colour,” says Maggie Zhu, who created the Chinese language meals weblog Omnivore’s Cookbook. The rice is commonly full of pink bean paste, and served with honey or sugar for added sweetness. Do that selection at Mee Sum Cafe or Ho Received Bake.
Northern Chinese language
It isn’t solely Southern China that prefers its sticky rice with a little bit of sugar. Candy varieties additionally dominate in Northern China, the place the rice doesn’t require any lye water and is thus chewier and firmer in texture. Based on Zhu, who grew up in Beijing, red bean zongzi are in style there, although it’s additionally frequent to combine the entire beans straight into the rice. Attempt candy pink bean zongzi at Mee Sum Cafe (the place it’s labeled Shanghai-style, as this ingredient can also be beloved within the jap Chinese language metropolis), or pay a go to to the Zongzi Lady who has bought totally different kinds of leaf-wrapped sticky rice outdoors New York Metropolis’s Grand Road subway station for over a decade. Zhu’s household additionally likes so as to add dried fruit into candy mixtures: “My grandma and my mother, they often make one with jujubes,” which steam alongside the rice and launch their perfume because the dish cooks.
Malaysian
If you unwrap sticky rice from bamboo leaves in Malaysia, the place the dish is known as bak zhang, you’ll usually discover one nook of the rice has been dyed blue, courtesy of bunga telang, a butterfly pea flower. “It’s imagined to carry good luck and chase away evil,” says Christina Arokiasamy, a chef who hails from Malaysia. Galangal, coriander seeds, and white peppercorn give the sticky rice an herbaceous aroma. The dish additionally gives a steadiness between candy and savory, because of candied winter melon and pork stomach. Discover it at Kopitiam in Manhattan’s Decrease East Aspect.
Shanghainese
In savory Shanghai-style zongzi, pork is the star of the present. For distinction and steadiness, these parcels usually embrace each fatty and lean chunks of meat. Because the zongzi boil and cook dinner, the fats melts, depositing taste into each kernel. The ensuing style is luscious and wealthy, but doesn’t style heavy. Earlier than wrapping, cooks coat the rice and fillings in soy sauce, which imparts unparalleled umami. Have a style for your self at Chinatown’s Supreme Restaurant.
Taiwanese
Annie Wang, a Taiwanese American meals author who blogs at Frites & Fries, grew up consuming a rendition of sticky rice emblematic of Taiwan. “For my household, each my mother and pop’s sides, we’re very pro-savory,” she says. Given the island’s strong shrimping trade, Wang explains, it’s no shock that zongzi from the southwest metropolis of Tainan usually embrace dried shrimp, in addition to shiitake mushrooms, dried scallops, peanuts, and pork. Pattern a selfmade model from the Zongzi Girl herself.
