Gongmian Noodle

Gongmian noodles, also called suomian noodles or silver noodles, is a specialty from Changshan county, Quzhou city. It is hand-made with flour, camellia oil and salty water. In the county, the noodle dish is popular on festive occasions, such as Spring Festival, birthday parties and weddings.

To make a bowl of delicious gongmian noodles, you add cooked camellia oil, pepper, chopped green onion and soy sauce to the soup, and then put the noodles into the soup when the water has boiled. It takes just a few minutes to get a bowl of well-cooked noodles. You can also add poached eggs to the noodle if you wish.

It takes more than 10 hours and a dozen of stages to make the noodles. People need to get up at 2 am so that they can dry the noodles in the sunshine and have them ready to sell to customers that day. It is an impressive scene to see a sheet of silk-like noodles dry under the sun and swing in the wind.

Changshan gongmian noodles originated in the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and came into vogue in the Song Dynasty (960-1279). During the reign of Emperor Jiajing of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), the noodles became a tribute to the imperial court.