Sea Intestine over Rice

Sea-intestine over rice is a seafood rice bowl made by quick-cooking fresh sea-intestine (the spoon worm) with garlic, scallion and rich stock, then ladling it over white rice; the sea-intestine is crisp-tender and bouncy, the sauce salty, savoury and thick, and stirred into the rice it becomes intensely bold—one of Weihai's most popular seafood dishes in recent years.

Sea-intestine is a specialty of the Jiaodong coast, long unknown beyond the region; Weihai cooks mastered high-heat stir-frying to keep its crispness and invented the "ladled-over-rice" style, pouring the sea-intestine and its sauce over rice and turning a once-niche ingredient into a dining-table sensation and a new emblem of Weihai's seafood cuisine.

Poured hot over white rice and mixed through at once, the crisp-tender sea-intestine and salty-savoury sauce soak into every grain, often lifted with garlic to mellow any brine, and ranks among the most-ordered dishes in Weihai's seafood restaurants.

The uniquely crisp and bouncy bite of sea-intestine, its bold salty-savoury sauce and the perfect union with rice are what set this bowl apart from seafood rices elsewhere.