Tasting Huaiyang Cuisine along the Canal in Huai'an: Wenlou Crab-roe Soup Dumplings Attracts Diners with Thin Skin and Rich Flavor

Located in Hexia Ancient Town in Huai'an, Wenlou Restaurant is opposite to Quxiang Pavilion on Xiao Lake. It presents customers a beautiful view, making itself a popular gathering place for literati. That's how the restaurant got its name, given that "wen" means "literature" in Chinese.

Wenlou Crab-roe Soup Dumplings [Photo by Mengfan]

When Wenlou Restaurant first opened, it sold tea and small dishes like pot-stewed meat and boiled shreds of dried tofu. Later, it sold the refined version of Shuitiaomian (a kind of dough made from flour, water, eggs, etc.) soup dumplings, and gradually established its reputation in making crab-roe soup dumplings. The skin of each crab-roe soup dumpling is as thin as a piece of paper, and its fillings are all made of soup.

When making crab-roe soup dumplings, the cooks of Wenlou will first make thick soup by use chicken, pork and meat skin, and then add crab roe and crab meat to the soup. The soup will be solidified when it cools. When the dumplings are heated, the solidified soup will be liquefied. That's the secret recipe of Wenlou's crab-roe soup dumpling that enables it to stand out among other soup dumplings. When eating a dumpling, one can suck the delicious soup with a rich flavor out before devouring the whole.

Wenlou Crab-roe Soup Dumplings [Photo by Mengfan]

Wenlou Restaurant is still improving the taste of its crab-roe soup dumplings, which is much less oily than before. Now, it sells crab-roe dumplings all year round, unlike days in the past when the crab-roe soup dumplings were only available in certain months of a year. Thanks to vacuum packaging technology, Wenlou’s crab-roe dumplings now can be delivered to diners in other places in China ordered online.