Shanghai Nosh Advisory, has teamed up with City Weekend to show you some of the best authentic local fare in Shanghai. In this blog, we visit Fengsheng Hutong (丰盛胡同) to check out their sesame meat biscuits (aka shāobǐng jiāròu).

When I was new to China and living in Beijing, shopping for food anywhere other than PriceSmart or Jenny Lou’s was always a struggle. With no Chinese language skills or understanding as to what real Chinese food was, I could seldom manage ordering anything at all at restaurants. When food did arrive on my table, it was never the General Tso’s chicken or sizzling rice soup that I grew up eating (and still long for). Many weekend outings were fruitless quests for such food.

One day I stumbled on Beijing’s Niujie (牛街), or Cow Street, a Muslim quarter where for centuries, many ethnic Hui people have set up shop. Hui cooking is renowned for its beef and lamb dishes, I soon found. Pointing ambiguously at sesame biscuits stuffed with slices of beef was enough to land my first taste of shāobǐng jiāròu (烧饼夹肉).

To make the shāobǐng biscuits, peanut oil and sesame paste are added to unleavened dough and then baked until they nearly break apart into buttery flakes. For the filling, beef is stewed in a broth spiced with aniseed, cloves and cinnamon. The meat is packed inside sliced shāobǐng, to make small sandwiches. The kitchen workflow is similar to that of a taqueria, where meat is cooked, hacked, paired with starch, garnished and sent on its way.

Since my first trip to Niujie, meat shāobǐng has been my favorite Chinese snack food, supplanting the special batch of fried wontons with sweet and sour sauce I had one time in Gilroy. Hui communities and their celebrated snack foods are hard to find in Shanghai, but do exist in clusters about Zhejiang Lu and other areas. The Beijing-style restaurant Fengsheng Hutong (丰盛胡同) serves the best meat shāobǐng I have found here so far – much better than those served at Chu Chu Yuan.

The beef filling used in Fengsheng’s shāobǐng is in fact a standalone dish called jiāng niúròu (酱牛肉), which is not difficult to prepare at home in a rice cooker or crockpot. In this dish, stewed beef tendon is sliced and served cold as charcuterie.

One meat shāobǐng is definitely not enough, unless you add a bowl of hearty lamb noodle soup (yángròu huìmiàn, 羊肉烩面). Knife-cut noodles are cooked in soup broth and supplemented with cubes of roast lamb and fěntiáo (粉条), a coarse vermicelli relative made from bean starch.

The lamb soup is served with chopped fresh cilantro, which to me is a delicious complement to many savory dishes, although it is apparently revolting to many people, including some famous chefs. The second condiment should cause no such controversy – oil infused with fried red pepper chunks. A few drops spread a biting, toasty flavor throughout your soup broth.

The decor at Fengsheng could be described as clunky Lao Beijing style, done half-way. But the run-down Ming chairs and rosewood screens do add a bit of nostalgia and do not detract from the taste of authentic Beijing cuisine.

DETAILS

What: Fengsheng Hutong (丰盛胡同)

Where: 416 Jinhui Lu (at Wuzhong Lu), 闵行区金汇路416号(近吴中路)

Tel: 021-51117711

English menu: Yes