Anshun Rice-Paper Rolls

Anshun rice-paper rolls wrap a paper-thin rice skin around pickled radish, fish mint, shredded kelp, bean sprouts and minced meat, brushed with a secret chilli sauce and rolled into a tube, tart, hot and vividly coloured.

The roll emerged in Anshun's streets in the 1990s and quickly became an indispensable everyday snack, ranked with crispy buns and cut-noodles as a name-card food of the city.

Rolled to order and eaten by hand, served cold with the heat level chosen to taste, the most common grab-and-go bite on Anshun's streets.

The translucent rice skin, the distinctive fragrance of fish mint and the tart-hot chilli sauce are the unmistakable marks of an Anshun roll.