Mountain cooking from old Huizhou: bamboo shoots, mushrooms and cured things, braised long and dark, with a taste for the fermented — stinky fish and hairy tofu.
Where it comes from
Hui cuisine comes from Huizhou, the old prefecture of misty mountains round Huangshan in the south of Anhui. It's inland, hilly country, so the cooking is of what the hills give — bamboo shoots, mushrooms, wild greens, tea — and of what keeps: ham, salted fish, preserved greens. Cooks describe it as heavy on oil, colour and fire, meaning rich, dark braises cooked slowly over charcoal.
In the Ming and Qing dynasties Huizhou's merchants traded salt and tea across China and grew very rich, and they took their cooks with them; that's often given as why a mountain cooking came to be counted among China's eight great cuisines. The province also has a river cooking along the Yangtze round Wuhu and Anqing, and a plainer, saltier wheat-country cooking in the north.
HefeiThe provincial capital, between the Yangtze and the Huai, and the home town of the late-Qing statesman Li Hongzhang, whose name is on its best-known dish.Li Hongzhang hotchpotch
WuhuA Yangtze river port, heart of the province's river cooking of freshwater fish, crab and smoked and braised duck — Wuwei's smoked duck comes from just across the river.Wuwei smoked duck
HuaibeiThe flat wheat country north of the Huai river, whose cooking is saltier, plainer and more northern — known above all for Fuliji's red-gold chicken.Fuliji roast chicken
How it cooks
Heavy oil, colour and fire
Rich, dark braises, simmered slowly so the sauce clings and the meat gives way.
Fermenting
Letting fish and tofu turn — salted mandarin fish, moulded 'hairy' tofu — for a deep, pungent savouriness.
Curing and smoking
Hams, salted fish, smoked ducks and preserved greens, made to last the winter in the hills.
Slow stewing
Clay pots set over low charcoal for hours, for pigeon with yam and the layered one-pot.