Traditional Snack of Beijing: Mahjong-shaped Pea Flour Cakes

As one part of Beijing culture, pea flour cake (豌豆黄) is a sort of traditional snack of Beijing, taking in the third day of the March lunar month under Beijing custom. It is light yellow and tastes sweet and cool, just smelting in your mouth. Its making process is as follows: grind up the pea, take off the skins, clean them up, boil until soft, frozen-up, finally cut into pieces.

The common pea flour cake is much simpler in production process that is made from boiled pea and jujube only. It presents the natural color and the taste.

Pea-Flour Cake, which is made of white pea, is a snack people usually eat in spring. White-pea flour is first mixed with water, cooked over gentle heat and then fried with sugar. After it solidifies, it is cut into rhombohedra-shaped pieces. It has both nice look and nice taste. The best point of it is its fine and smooth texture that melt at the same time when you put it in your mouth.

The restaurant, “Sishitongtang”, serves not only delicious food, but also tastes of traditional Beijing culture represented by daily life in hutongs. While eating various delicacies, diners can enjoy storytelling performances in Beijing dialect accompanied by drums to soak up the past and trace the ups and downs of historical figures.

Ready to have a taste of pea-flour cake?

Copyright: SKETCHES OF CLASSIC BEIJING, China Pictorial Press

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