Fish-Mint Salad is the signature cold plate of Guizhou, built on the raw white rhizome of fishwort (Houttuynia cordata), known locally as zhe'ergen. The crisp, snappy underground stems are pinched into short lengths, rinsed clean, and tossed cold with a Guizhou dressing of ground roasted chili (hu-la-jiao) or chili oil, light soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, scallion and a little sugar. The herb carries a pungent, distinctly fishy aroma that splits the table: locals eat it by the bowlful, while outsiders often recoil at first taste. Sour, salty, and chili-fragrant, the dressing is tuned precisely to frame rather than mask that polarizing perfume. It is one of the most recognizable everyday flavors of Guizhou home and street cooking.
Fishwort (Houttuynia cordata) is a long-recorded edible and medicinal herb in China: the early agricultural almanac Xia Xiao Zheng notes the gathering of ji (ji-cai, the plant's classical name), and the name yu-xing-cao ('fish-smell herb') appears in the Tang-era materia medica Ming Yi Bie Lu. The everyday name zhe'ergen, used across Guizhou, Sichuan and Yunnan, is generally traced to ji'er-gen ('root of ji'), the knotty rhizome studded with ear-like fibrous roots. As a tossed cold dish, however, Fish-Mint Salad has no datable inventor or founding moment; it is folk home cooking that grew up wherever the herb is dug. In the southwest the white rhizome is prized as a raw vegetable, while in the lower Yangtze and the north the same plant is more often used dried as medicine, which is why the cold salad reads as quintessentially Guizhou-Sichuan.
The raw rhizome is the whole point of the texture: cool, glassy-crisp, and snappy, breaking with an audible crunch and leaving a faint stringy, fibrous chew. The aroma hits first and hard — sharp, green, and unmistakably fishy — then the dressing lands sour and salty with the toasty heat of ground chili and a bright bite of raw garlic. A pinch of sugar rounds the edges, and tender leaves, if added, give a softer, more herbal note. The longer you chew, the more the herb's pungency mellows into something oddly savory and moreish.
Everything here is raw and cold by design. The white rhizome is eaten uncooked so it keeps its taut, water-crisp snap; cooking would collapse that cell turgor and turn it limp and stringy, so the prep is limited to trimming, repeated rinsing to wash off grit, and a short cold soak (some cooks give it a brief blanch only to soften the smell, at the cost of crunch). The signature fishy aroma comes from a volatile compound in the herb's essential oil, classically identified as decanoyl acetaldehyde (houttuynin, yu-xing-cao-su); recent aroma research debates which oxidized aldehyde dominates, but the pungent 'fish-smell' character is consistently tied to these volatiles, which are most intense raw and fade with heat and time. The dressing is built cold and acid-forward: vinegar and raw garlic cut through the herb's pungency, salt and soy season, while ground roasted chili (hu-la-jiao) or chili oil contributes toasty aroma rather than just heat — the toasting builds Maillard-derived nuttiness that bridges the gap to the herb's raw funk. The aim is balance, not erasure: the dressing frames the polarizing perfume instead of hiding it.
Variations
Across Guizhou and Sichuan the cold-tossed format stays constant while the chili changes: hu-la-jiao (dried chili roasted and crushed) gives the most classic toasty version, while chili oil (you-la-jiao) or pounded ci-ba chili makes a redder, oilier plate. Some cooks toss only the white rhizome; others mix in the tender heart-shaped leaves for a greener, more herbal bowl. Sichuan versions often lean on red chili oil, Sichuan-pepper numbness and sugar; Guizhou versions favor the ground-chili (hu-la) and sour profile and frequently fold the herb into a dipping-sauce (zhan-shui) for grilled or boiled foods rather than serving it as a salad alone. Younger cooks add cilantro, toasted peanuts or crisp soybeans, and the herb has even crossed into novelty products like zhe'ergen yogurt.
On the Palate
Where Fish-Mint Salad sits in the Chinese flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 4
How it's made
6 steps · 18 min
- 13 min
Pick over the fishwort: snap off the tough older roots and hairy fibers, keeping the tender white rhizomes (and the heart-shaped leaves, if using).
- 25 min
Rinse the rhizomes several times in cold water to wash off all grit, then soak in cold water about 5 minutes and drain well; pinch into roughly 3 cm lengths.
Watch outSoak and rinse the fishwort in cold water, keeping it raw — cook it and the crisp cell turgor collapses into limp, stringy roots.
- 34 min
Make the toasted chili: cut dried chilies into short sections and crisp them in warm oil until fragrant and just darkened, then crush into a coarse ground chili (or use ready chili oil).
Watch outCrisp the dried chilies in warm oil only until fragrant and just darkened — take them past that and the ground chili turns bitter instead of nutty.
- 42 min
In a bowl, mix the ground roasted chili and its oil with light soy sauce, vinegar, salt, sugar, minced garlic and scallion to make the cold dressing.
- 51 min
Add the drained fishwort to the dressing and toss thoroughly so every piece is coated.
- 63 min
Let it sit 2-3 minutes for the flavors to meld, toss once more, and serve cold.
