West Lake Fish in Vinegar Gravy facts for kids

West Lake Fish in Vinegar Gravy (pronounced see-hoo-tsoo-yoo) is a famous and traditional dish from Hangzhou, a city in China's Zhejiang province. It's also sometimes called Song Sao Fish. This special meal first appeared a long time ago, during the Southern Song dynasty.

The main ingredient for this dish is usually a type of fish called grass carp. After the fish is cooked, the chef pours a special sauce made from sugar and vinegar over it. This sauce makes the fish taste tender and sweet, and it even gives it a unique flavor that reminds some people of crab!

What's in the Dish?

Main Ingredients

• Grass carp
• Vinegar
• Sugar

Seasonings

• Rice wine
• Ginger
• Scallion (green onion)
• Starch (to thicken the sauce)

History of the Dish

West Lake Fish in Vinegar Gravy comes from Lin'an, which is now the city of Hangzhou. To understand its history, we need to learn about a dish called "Sister Song's Fish Soup."

Song Wusao was a very skilled female chef during the Southern Song Dynasty. One day, the Emperor Zhao Gou was on a boat trip on West Lake. He tried her fish soup and loved it very much! Because of the emperor's praise, Song Wusao became very famous for her cooking skills. People even called her a "master" of fish dishes.

Over time, "Sister Song's Fish Soup" became well-known. Later, other talented chefs updated the recipe. This updated version eventually became the famous dish we know today as West Lake Fish in Vinegar Gravy.

Today, you can find West Lake Fish in Vinegar Gravy in many famous restaurants in Hangzhou. However, it's not a dish that people usually make at home every day. Some restaurants even use bass instead of grass carp for this dish.

Special Features of the Dish

Chefs are very careful when choosing the fish for this dish. They usually pick a grass carp that weighs about one and a half catty (which is about 750 grams). The weight of the fish is important because it affects how long it needs to cook and how much heat to use.

The cooking process is very precise. The fish needs to be cooked perfectly in just three or four minutes. When it's done right, the fish has a special flavor that tastes a bit like crab.

West Lake Fish in Vinegar Gravy is known for being shiny but not oily. It tastes salty without needing extra salt, and it's fresh without needing MSG (a flavor enhancer).

A Famous Legend

There's a popular story about how this dish came to be. It's about two brothers, named Song and his younger brother, who were fishermen. A bad person named Zhao, who was friends with the local government, saw Song's wife and wanted to marry her. So, he sadly killed Song.

Song's wife and the younger brother couldn't fight against Zhao because he was powerful. Song's wife told the younger brother to leave Hangzhou to stay safe from Zhao. As a farewell, she cooked a fish with sugar and vinegar. The younger brother was surprised by the sweet and sour taste, as he had never tried fish cooked this way before.

Song's wife explained that the sweet taste was to encourage him to work hard for a better life. The sour taste was to remind him of the unfair and difficult life poor people had. The younger brother was very touched. He left Hangzhou and worked hard. Years later, he became an important official and was able to put the villain Zhao in jail.

When he tried to find his sister-in-law, he couldn't, because she had hidden away from Zhao. One day, while eating lunch at a restaurant, he tasted a fish that reminded him exactly of his sister-in-law's cooking. He asked who the chef was and was surprised to find it was his sister-in-law! The younger brother then took Song's wife home, quit his job, and they went back to fishing.

Later, a famous poet tried this dish and was very impressed. The poet wrote a poem on the restaurant wall, which included a line that refers to this very legend: "何必归寻张翰鲈，鱼美风味说西湖；亏君有此调和手，识得当年宋嫂无。" This line talks about the wonderful flavor of West Lake fish and asks if the chef has the same skill as Sister Song from the old story.