Raw fish---the Local Delicacy

The Hezhes have the habit of eating raw fish. There are good ways to eat fish skin, fish eggs, fish fresh and fish soft bone in raw state. The most popular dish is "raw fish with greens". They often eat it raw, seasoning the freshly sliced meat with wild ginger, shallot, capsicum, vinegar and salt. If there is no vinegar, they will season it with the chokeberry juice, and it is pretty delicious.

The folklore tells that this famous dish is passed down by a Hezhe woman. Long long ago, there was a newly married daughter-in-law, who was so smart and pretty that nothing was difficult for her. One day, her father-in-law brought to her a difficult problem of cooking fish. It was required that the fish seem to be raw and actually it should be cooked. So she chose two fresh carps, sliced the meat quickly with knife, and put the pieces of meat into the birchen basin with vinegar. Then she broiled the fishskin over the fire, and shook it so that the scales could be shook off and the fishskin with a burnt color became crisp and smells delicious. She sliced the fishskin as well, and put the slices into the basin, then added the seasonings, and churned up. A basin of raw fish was served up. When tasting, her father-in-law praised her over and again. Therefore, down came the imitative method of cooking "raw fish with greens." Nowadays, the materials for this dish become complete, involving slices of cucumber, cabbage, spinach and potato, seasoned with monosodium glutamate, wild ginger, refined salt, capsicum oil, shallot, garlic and other condiments. It is tasty, smells delicious with an alluring color. Eating and drinking on their fisher, the fisher folks will be very happy, and they will sing when excited.

"Frozen fish slices" is informally called "parings" by the Hans. It is made in winter, by peeling off the skin of the frozen fish and slicing the meat like paring. Then you can have the meat with the seasonings. "Raw caviar" is a nutritious dish. Its main material is the jacinth crystalline caviar of salmon, which is as big as soybean, or the greenblack caviar of Huso dauricus, which is as big as grain. The caviar is seasoned with salt, vinegar, ginger, garlic, capsicum and caraway, and then the dish can be served. The Hezhes' particular methods of having fish also involve dried fish bar, dried fish trunk, dried fish floss and so on.

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