Fujian · soup
Buddha Jumps Over the Wall
佛跳墙 · Fótiàoqiáng
Fujian's banquet centrepiece — a slow-simmered soup of dried abalone, sea cucumber, scallop, ham and 20+ other ingredients.
Buddha Jumps Over the Wall is a Fujian-cuisine banquet showpiece — supposedly named for a story of a Buddhist monk leaping over a temple wall to taste it. The dish is a single-pot soup of around 20 dried and fresh ingredients: dried abalone, sea cucumber, dried scallop, fish maw, Yunnan ham, chicken, pork tendon, mushroom, quail eggs, plus aromatics, simmered together for 6–10 hours. Served in individual ceramic pots. Among the most expensive single dishes in Chinese banquet cuisine; a high-end version can run ¥2,000+ per portion.
Where to try
Fuzhou: Juchunyuan (the institutional house, 1865-founded). High-end Cantonese banquet houses across China.
Dietary notes
Shellfish, multiple animal products.
Other south dishes
- Beef Chow Fun干炒牛河
Flat rice noodles dry-fried with silky marinated beef, beansprouts and spring onion over a fierce wok flame.
- Beef Chow Fun干炒牛河
Stir-fried wide flat rice noodles with sliced beef, scallion, bean sprouts and a smoky wok-hei flavour.
- Cantonese Roast Goose烧鹅
Whole goose roasted to crisp-skinned tenderness. The most prized of the Cantonese siu mei roasted meats.
- Char Siu (BBQ Pork)叉烧
Cantonese roast pork — marinated, hung in special ovens, glazed with honey and maltose. Eaten over rice or in buns.