A fist-sized, near-translucent steamed bun from Jingjiang (Taizhou, Jiangsu) filled with crab roe, crabmeat, minced pork and pork-skin aspic that liquefies into hot soup during steaming, eaten by sipping the soup before the bun.
The bun is the signature snack of Jingjiang, a county-level city on the north bank of the Yangtze administered by Taizhou, Jiangsu, and "Jingjiang Crab-Roe Soup Bun" is a registered Chinese geographical-indication certification mark; its making technique was listed as Jiangsu provincial intangible cultural heritage in 2009. Its precise origin is not documented, but the form belongs to the wider Huaiyang soup-bun tradition. Local eating custom is fixed in a rhyme, "lift gently, move slowly, open a window, then sip the soup," referring to picking the bun up by its pleats, biting a small vent, and drawing out the hot soup before eating the skin and filling.
The skin is rolled paper-thin and nearly translucent, so the filling shows through; the bun arrives fist-sized and trembling. Bitten or pierced, it releases a flood of hot, intensely crab- and chicken-fragrant soup, golden with crab roe and pork fat, sipped through a straw or a bitten vent before the soft skin and crabmeat filling are eaten.
The "soup" is pork-skin aspic: pork skin is simmered for hours in chicken-and-pork stock so its collagen hydrolyses and dissolves, then chilled until the collagen re-links into a firm gel, which is diced and mixed with crab roe, crabmeat and minced pork. Wrapped cold and solid, the aspic re-melts to liquid during steaming as the gelatin denatures above roughly 35°C, becoming the soup inside the bun. The skin is a high-gluten water-mixed unleavened dough rolled extremely thin yet elastic, pleated tightly so it holds the liquefying filling without bursting; steaming is brief and precise, about 7 minutes over boiling water, long enough to set the skin and melt the aspic but short enough that the skin does not soften and tear.
Variations
Within the soup-bun family, Jingjiang's is the largest and thinnest-skinned, with a crab-roe filling and a near-liquid centre. Huai'an's Wenlou crab-roe soup bun, made at a shop founded in 1817 (Qing Jiaqing reign), is also famously thin-skinned with an almost wholly liquid filling. Yangzhou's soup buns are an older lineage, the Qing-era Yangzhou Huafang Lu recording a teahouse "known for guantang soup-filled buns," while Kaifeng's guantangbao is the northern, often pork-only style frequently cited as the soup-bun's ancestor. Out of the autumn crab season, a non-crab version filled only with pork and aspic is common.
On the Palate
Where Jingjiang Crab-Roe Soup Bun sits in the Chinese flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 4
How it's made
8 steps · 1 hour
- 1210 min
Simmer cleaned pork skin with the fat removed in chicken-and-pork stock over low heat for several hours until the collagen fully dissolves; strain.
- 2240 min
Chill the stock until it sets into a firm aspic, then dice it.
Watch outChill the stock until it sets into a firm, sliceable aspic before dicing — if it's too soft it melts while you fold it in and the soup leaks during wrapping.
- 325 min
Pick crab roe and crabmeat from steamed crabs; combine with minced pork, ginger, scallion and seasoning into a filling.
- 410 min
Fold the diced aspic gently into the crab-and-pork filling.
- 535 min
Make a water-mixed high-gluten dough, rest it, then divide and roll into ultra-thin rounds, slightly thicker at the centre.
- 620 min
Place a generous portion of filling on each wrapper and pleat the edges tightly into a fist-sized bun, sealing the top.
- 77 min
Steam over rapidly boiling water for about 7 minutes, until the skin sets and the aspic has melted to soup.
Watch outSteam over hard-boiling water for about 7 minutes, just until the skin sets and the aspic has melted back to soup — over-steam and the thin skin bursts and drains.
- 83 min
Serve at once with Zhenjiang vinegar and shredded ginger; sip the soup before eating the bun.
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