Tuojiang River Small Fish

Tuojiang small fish are the small river fish caught in the Tuojiang that flows through the old town, no longer than a finger, most often dry-fried or pan-fried with dried chilli, Sichuan pepper, perilla and garlic until the whole fish turns crisp enough to eat bones and all, hot and fragrant with a faint sweet finish.

The Tuojiang is Fenghuang's mother river, and the Miao and Tujia families who live along its banks have fished it for generations, handing down the method of dry-frying its small fish with local spices until it became a homely招牌 of old-town restaurants and riverside stilted-house tables.

Usually brought out by the heaped plate to go with drink or rice, the crisp little fish eaten bones and all in a blast of heat, paired with a bowl of rice tofu or Miao she-fan, the truest taste of a Tuojiang household.

A whole fish crisp enough to chew, the western-Hunan heat of perilla and dried chilli, and the taste of a river that runs through the town itself are what mark out Tuojiang small fish.