Chang An Dapaidang 长安大排档 @ Xian

My first time in Xian and totally unfamiliar with local cuisines or restaurants to go to. I simple picked the most popular one on the food app near my hotel in the middle of the old town.

Chang An Dapaidang 长安大排档 is a chain restaurant that has 8 branches all round Xi’an, and all the locations are strategically close to all the tourist attractions. This one that we went to is very close to the Drum Tower in the middle of the old city.

Once we were settled down and ordered our meal, a packet of peanuts was given to us complement of the house. To our surprise, the peanut shell was sweet and we finished the peanuts in no time.

一壶老稠酒 Xian Chou Wine

What’s the best thing to go with peanuts? Some rice wine, and an old friend messaged me to try the Shaanxi special glutinous rice wine called Chou wine 稠酒, which literally translated to “cloudy wine”. It is a kind of 醪醴 (láo lǐ) wine that originated from the Tang Dynasty (618-907), and has only less than 2% alcohol if just fermented. It can be fermented further to over 10%, but these ones we had were the 2% version. It was sweet and creamy, more like a beverage than a wine.

辣子蒜羊血 Spicy Garlic Mutton Blood Pudding

Blood pudding is one of my favourite food; it is made with coagulated blood of livestocks and resembled jelly. It soaks up all the flavours of the sauce or stew that it is cooked in and often paired with mala style 麻辣 (“numbing and spicy”) of Sichuan cuisine. Shaanxi has a similar version that is spicy, not too numbing, probably a modern invention as chilli was brought in the Portuguese and Dutch sailors in 16th century. Chilli was used a cheaper substitute to salt as a condiment and only become prevalent in 19th century.

油泼(Biang Biang)面 Spicy Biang Biang Noodles

This noodle is perhaps one of the most famous noodle dishes outside of China. Biang Biang noodles is a Shaanxi noodle dish, named after the sound the dough makes when it is slapped on the table to broaden the noodles. Perhaps the sound was unique as the Chinese character that was designated for the sound is the most complicated character still in use today.

I ate a lot of biang biang noodles in different cities around China, and this is by far one of the better ones that I have tasted. The noodle was one single long strand with sufficient bite and cooked al dente. The sauce used had a slight sour taste from the black vinegar that was really fragrant. Combined with the spices and chilli, it was a really good eat.

老味烧三鲜 Three Flavour Stew in Traditional Way

This is a typical Shaanxi cuisine cooked in every household. The main ingredients are deep fried pork skin 响皮, quail eggs 鹌鹑蛋, deep fried meat balls 炸丸子, pork belly, bean curd, black wood fungus, mushrooms, dried bean curd skin and bokchoy. These ingredients are stewed together to produce a heartening pot of goodness that is rice killer.

炝拌野菜 Mix Wild Vegetables

灰灰菜 Wild goosefoot is used for this salad of sorts. The main ingredients for the dressing are sesame oil, vinegar and a peppercorn oil. The bitter taste and rough texture of the wild herb is an acquired taste.

枣沫糊 Jujube Paste

It was quite a large portion for only ¥9, but it was not thick like Cantonese black sesame paste. It was like slight more saturated version of jujube drink in a can that you get from Chinese supermarkets.

醪糟鸡蛋 Poached Egg in Fermented Glutinous Rice Soup

This was similar to the Shanghai dessert glutinous rice balls in wine lee 酒酿丸子, just that it had an added egg into the sweet and slightly sour soup.

A good place to be introduced to the various street food and good eats of Xian and Shaanxi. Of course you can get it cheaper at the various food streets around the old town, but for the price to set down and eat in comfort it was worth a visit. Various locations around the most popular tourist attractions around Xian, so you cannot miss it.

Chang An Dapaidang 长安大排档 (钟楼图书馆店)
西安市莲湖区北大街28号
Tel : +86 (29) 8958 5858

Visited Mar 2024