Crispy Rice Dish,Only in Tianjin

Crispy rice dish is one of the most famous local snacks in Tianjin with a long history evolved from Shandong pancakes. There are many legends about it.One legend goes like this:to survive in Tianjin,one person from Shandong created new ways of making pancakes.He cut the round pancake into slices and added a kind of recipe sauce for selling,thus receiving high popula.

The other story is as follows:one student who went to Beijing for the imperial examination encountered some trouble in Tianjin.Luckily,he met a grandma called Senior Li who gave him a bowl of rice with soup.He felt it was the most delicious food in the world.Later on,the student passed the examination fortunately,came back to repay the favor Senior Li ever saved him and asked her what she gave him to eat.Senior Li just had a thought and said”crispy rice dish”.Since then,the snack got the name and rose to fame.

Besides,it has been said that the origin of”crispy rice dish”was related to Tianjin’s top restaurant”Dafulai Restaurant”.The founder of the restaurant was Zhang Lan,who was said to be the descendant of Zhang Qing,one figure described in Water Margin.At first,Zhang Lan ran a store selling pancakes in Tianjin.One day, Qianlong Emperor made a trip in disguise and entered the store for eating pancake. When he was eating the pancake rolled with scallion,he felt so thirsty that it was hard to swallow.He immediatedly ordered a soup.The waiter had a quick wit,sliced the pancake and added some sauce with hot water.When he delivered the dish to the table,he was worried whether the Emperor would be angry to blame him.But fortunately,the Emperor thought it was incredibly delicious after having a taste.So he turned to the waiter for the name of the dish.The waiter didn’t hear quite clearly thinking wrongly that the Emperor asked what his name was.He answered by”Guo Ba”-his name without hesitation.Then,the dish was called”Guobacai”(the same accent as his name). 

hancheng

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