Dishes
Savoury tangyuan soup
鹹湯圓
Also called: 肉湯圓 · savoury rice-ball soup
Pork-filled glutinous rice balls in a savoury pork-bone broth.
Photo: Ralff Nestor Nacor, CC BY-SA 4.0
Photo: Ralff Nestor Nacor, CC BY-SA 4.0
Photo: Zheng Zhou, CC BY-SA 4.0What it is
Soft, chewy glutinous-rice balls with a minced pork filling, served in a pork-bone broth.
Where it comes from
Traditionally eaten at the Lantern Festival, tangyuan are also linked in many places with the winter solstice and Lunar New Year. Their name sounds close to the word for reunion (團圓), so they are said to stand for family togetherness.
How it is made
Glutinous rice dough is wrapped around the minced pork filling and rolled into balls by hand, then cooked and served in broth. Ching Hsi makes its tangyuan and meatballs by hand each day.
How to eat it
The mixed soup (綜合湯) puts tangyuan in the same bowl as shrimp balls and pork meatballs.
In Kaohsiung
Ching Hsi on Sanfeng Middle Street, Kaohsiung, has served savoury tangyuan for more than 60 years and is often the first choice of locals.
Where to eat it in Kaohsiung
清溪小吃部Ching Hsi Snack Shop
An old-fashioned eatery on the Sanfeng Middle Street dried-goods strip, going for about seventy years, best known for savoury pork tangyuan soup and sticky rice.
合春圓仔（林園店）He Chun Tangyuan (Linyuan)
A roughly seventy-year-old dessert shop in Linyuan's old town, now run by the third generation, known for chewy handmade tangyuan served over shaved ice.
Sources