1. Shanghai style sesame biscuit
This cake got its name as its round shape and brown color are quite like crab shell. It is firstly prepared from oil and fermented flour into flat round biscuit, and then toasted in oven with some sesame stained on the surface. The cake tastes delicious, and moderately sweet and salty, and the surface is quite crisp. Once, someone wrote a poem for the cake “smell the taste of the cake even without seeing it, and the crisp surface falls only with a small bite". Basically, there are two kinds of cakes, namely sweet and salty. For salty cakes, the filling is made from oil and shallot, fresh meat, crab meal, and shrimp, while for sweet one, the filling is from white sugar, rose, sweetened bean paste, date jam.
This cake is best made by Wu Wan Cake House located near intersection of Shimenyilu and Weihaiwei Road.
2. Steak Rice Cake
Steak rice cake is one typical and economical snack with a history more than 50 years in Shanghai. Shanghai now sees two famous restaurants with this cake – “Xiao Chang Zhou" and “Xian De Lai". “Xiao Chang Zhou" makes its cake with chine pork from Changzhou and Wuxi. Firstly, sauce the pork, and then put it into the hollowware with sauce, oil, sugar, shallot, ginger and wine. When the pork becomes mauve, it will become more tender and sweet, and then take it out. “Xian De Lai" makes its rice cake in this way: stir the mixture of flour, water chestnut flour, wuxiangfen and egg, and use it to wrap the steak; then fry the wrapped steak in oil. The finished steak is golden, crisp and tender. Afterwards, roll the steak in Songjiang rice with sauce and sweet soy sauce, and finally add pepper sauce.
This steak rice cake is best made in Shuguang restaurant and “Xian De Lai" in Shanghai.
3. Pan-fried Steamed Bun Stuffed with Chicken
Pan-fried steamed bun stuffed with chicken is a typical snack in Shanghai. It is prepared from the fermented flour into wrapping. And then stuff the wrapping with cooked diced chicken, minced pork shoulder, and pork jelly and balm. After that, dip some shallot and sesame, and brush some vegetable oil onto it. Finally, fry the bun in he pan. Generally, the bun presents golden sesame and shallot on the top part, and eats soft. Meanwhile, after being fried, the bottom part of the bun is quite crisp and sweet.
This snack made by Wangjiasha Snack of Shanghai is most famous.
4. Cooked Snail in Rice Wine Sauce
The main reason for the fame of Shanghai cooked snail lies in that its snail mainly comes from Tunxi of Anhui, which usually is bigger. Before cooking the snail, firstly you need to put the snail in the clear water for two days, which aims to make the snail spit all the sand in its body. After that, put the snail in the hollowware, and add some fennel and Chinese cinnamon. After the snail is boiled for a longer time, take it out, and add rice wine sauce. The finished snail presents brown gray color with tender meat, and is quite favored by people.
This snack is best made in Wuweizhai and Xian De Lai of Shanghai.
5. Xiaoshaoxing Chicken Rice Soup
Xiaoshaoxing was established in year 1947 by a person from Shaoxing of Zhejiang. Besides the founder, the main cooks in the restaurant were at that time all mainly from Shaoxing, thus making the restaurant then named Xiaoshaoxing Chicken Soup restaurant. The rice is cooked in chicken soup, and mixed with chicken meat and other seasoning. Together with the soup, there is usually 3cm-long, and 0.6cm-wide chopped chicken with shallot, ginger and chicken oil available. The chicken soup is yellow amid green, and chicken meat is white and bright, jointly making it quite amazing, and appetizing. Besides rich nutrition, the soup tastes smooth and sweet.
This soup is only available in Shanghai Xiaoshaoxing.
6. Nanxiang Steamed Bun
Nanxiang steamed bun, also named Nanxiang xialongbao, is a traditional snack in Nanxiang town of Shanghai suburb with a history more than one hundred years. Nanxiang xialong is famous for its thin wrapping, sufficient filling, and fresh flavor. The filling here is made of pork jam without shallot and garlic, but only with a little ginger and meat jelly, salt, sauce, sugar and water. The wrapping is made of flour without fermentation, usually 50 gram flour for 8 xiaolong. The cooked xiaolong is quite lovely, crystal, like pagoda. When you take a small bite, your mouth will be filled with sweet juice. If the xiaolong is accompanied with ginger and vinegar, and a bowl of egg silk soup, it will be much better. In addition, the filling is changing in different seasons, like shrimp added in early spring, and crab meat, crab roe, and crab oil in autumn.
Nanxiang xiaolong in Yuyuan is one of the famous snacks there.
7. Noodle with scallion, oil and dried shrimp
This noodle is also one of typical snacks in Shanghai, and it has to go through several processes. Firstly, cut shallot into bars, and fry it in oil. By this way, the shallot looked deep red and golden, tastes sweet and appetizing. Then, mix the shallot with shrimp, which has been stir-fried by vegetable oil, and soaked by wine and sugar. The next step is to cook the noodle. After that, mix the shallot and shrimp with noodle together, and the dish is finished. The noodle looks bright, and eats refreshing, with sweet flavor of shrimp and shallot. Meanwhile, the noodle is rich in nutrition, and welcomed by people.
Noodle with scallion, oil and dried shrimp is not only the typical snack in Shanghai Hubin Snack House, but also in Chenghuangmao.
8. Vegetarian Steamed Bun (Baozi)
Vegetarian baozi is one of the snacks in Song Yue Lou Vegetarian Restaurant. The restaurant has 70 years' history, and is the incorporation of different schools, like Beijing, Suzhou, Yangzhou together, in addition to the Shanghai local vegetarian dishes. The restaurant is particularly noted for its stir-fried vegetable, stir-fried mushroom, Luohan vegetarian dish, mushroom and crispy rice soup, fried crab meat, noodles with glue in soy sauce in Shanghai. Apart from this, the restaurant is also well-known by its vegetarian baozi. The baozi is prepared from high-quality flour for wrapping, and vegetable, flour gluten, mushroom, and winter bamboo shoot, wuxiang toufu for filling with seasoning of balm, and sugar, etc. After braised in the bamboo steamer, the baozi is quite bright and soft, being attractive. Open the steamer, you can immediately smell the flavor everywhere in the room.
This baozi can be found in Song Yue Lou Vegetarian Restaurant in Yuyuan, shanghai.
9. Fried Mantou
Fried mantou is one typical snack in Shendacheng restaurant. The restaurant has absorbed better skills from other restaurants to cook this dish: the making of wrapping is similar to Nanxiang xiaolong, being prepared from high-quality flour without fermentation; the making of filling comes from the tongbao in Huai and Yang River reaches, add bone soup to meat filling and whisk, then add shallot, ginger and garlic; the process of frying is close to the making of fried crisp biscuit. The finished mantou presents golden, and lovely, eats crisp with tender filling, which makes you still feel the flavor even after you finish having it. To have mantou when it is hot, it will be more delicious, and leaves aftertaste.
10. Leishayuan
Leishayuan is one typical snack in Qiaojiashan restaurant, with a history of more than 70 years. During the late years of Qing dynasty, a woman with last name Lei in Sanpailou of Shangahi, created the method of rolling the cooked tangtuan with some flour, for the purpose of carrying it easily. In memory of this woman, people later named the tangtuan Leishayuan. In Qiaojiashan restaurant, they firstly grind the red bean from Chongming county, and then air-dry it. Besides the filling of sweetened red bean paste, Qiaojiashan also provides tangtuan with other filling, like fresh meat, sesame. Then cook the tangtuan in boiling water, and follow to remove it to drain. After that, roll the tangtuan with some bean paste meal. The tangtuan made in this way not only looks attractive, but also tastes sweet, and soft, and is welcomed by people from various areas.
Famous local foods includes: Lotus Root Stuffed with Sweet Rice, pigeon egg dumpling, towel gourd, pickled melon, Prawn Crackers, Songjiang perch, Xiaoshaoxing tender boiled chicken with soy sauce, Daoxiangcun preserved duck gizzard, Fengjing braised trotter, Jinjing preserved beancurd, dried toufu, juicy peach, Tinglin melon, Chenghuangmiao flavored bean, Ligaotang (Ligao candy), sanhuang chicken with sesame oil, fried meat in sweet sauce, Wufangzhai rice cake.