Keelung Koufu Mahua: The Story Behind a Single Fried Dough Twist

When it comes to eating, many of today's foods and the foods of the past are truly no longer the same thing, from ingredients to flavor. So when writing an article like this, I try as much as possible to restore the imprint left by traditional life, to let it warm the memory and awaken the taste buds; perhaps a bland life then gains a bit of savor.

Mahua is a very ordinary food, eaten in both north and south, and it has quite a long history. The elder Zhitang once quoted his fellow townsman Fan Yin's Yue Yan: "Mahua, namely fried Hui, has come down to us from distant ages; to this day people hate the millers who skimp on labor and have no sense of shame." He also quoted the Qing dynasty drama scholar Liu Tingji's Zaiyuan Zazhi: "Dongcheng says that, exiled to Huangzhou for five years, ... he crossed the Yellow River to Wangjiaying and saw several fried ghosts hanging under a straw shed. Made with salt water mixed with flour, twisted into two strands like a thick rope, five or six cun long, fried in hot oil until yellow, the taste is quite good," wanting to show that "fried Hui" or "fried ghost" is mahua. In fact it is not so: the taste of mahua is sweet and fragrant, and what is added to the dough is sugar; the taste of youtiao is salty and fragrant, and what is added when mixing the dough is salt.

Qing Bai Lei Chao says: "The fried Hui is as long as a person, the dough is pounded thin, two strips are twisted into one, and it is fried like a rope. At first it resembled a human shape, with two hands above and two feet below... The people of Song hated Qin Hui for ruining the country, so they made it in a likeness to execute him," and this refers to youtiao, which matches the legend about the origin of youtiao by West Lake. According to folk legend, mahua was originally a palace food, and when it spread to the people it was two strips of dough stuck together. During the Qianlong reign of the Qing dynasty, a merchant from Xiwei Village, Qudian, Jishan, brought it back to his hometown Yuncheng and improved it, finally turning the original two strands into three, twisted together; after frying, the twisted pattern was neat and good-looking.

Seen this way, mahua seems more like two strands of youtiao improved.

The dough must rise for good mahua

In Keelung, Kofuu Mahua makes that kind of fried large crisp mahua. It is about a chi long, as thick as a child's fist. I remember eating freshly fried Northeastern large mahua as a child; that crisp, soft, sweet taste has stayed fragrant in my memory to this day. I remember that when making mahua, you first mix a little salt, sugar and egg into the flour, then add some starter dough (also called old dough or dough starter) to let the dough rise. Note this word "rise": if the dough does not rise well, the fried mahua will not be crisp and light.

After letting the risen dough rest a bit, spread flour on the kneading board, take the rested dough and knead it into long strips, then twist it into even portions, then rub each into a thin strip for making mahua. Hold one end in each hand, stretch it, then stretch again, about two or three times, then bring both hands together, and the dough naturally twists together following the force of your hands. At this point, pour plenty of soybean oil into a large black iron wok on the stove; when a faint blue smoke rises from the wok, it is hot enough. Lower the twisted mahua against the surface of the oil into the wok with a soft "sizzle, sizzle," a puff of oily smoke rises, and the twisted strips of dough slowly swell, gradually taking on the shape of mahua.

The fully swollen large mahua, about a chi long, rolls up and down with the hot oil, its color going from pale yellow to golden yellow, until jujube red. At this point you use the extra-long iron chopsticks in your hand to keep turning and flipping it so the mahua heats evenly. Keelung's Kofuu Mahua has the simple, rugged quality of Keelung Miaokou food; besides flour, oil and white sugar, it is also mixed with icing sugar, so chewing it in your mouth gives a pure flour fragrance and a light sweetness.

The large mahua just pulled from the big oil wok is even better, eaten while hot. Because the strips of dough are fairly thick, the dough in the middle is cooked but the oil has not soaked in, so the texture is not greasy, crisp, soft and fragrant, melting in the mouth, almost needing no hard chewing; in a moment, one mahua is already in your belly. This large mahua is very filling; one mahua can solve the problem of a meal. Mahua is a fried food that does not spoil easily and can serve as dry rations, eaten on the road or as a quick lunch. In primary school, when there was no time to go home for lunch, a single mahua often did the job. At that time, being able to eat mahua counted as a good life, and the adults at home were still doting on the children.

All kinds of mahua on the street, warm imprints of tradition

I have also eaten other kinds of mahua. When studying away from home, Tianjin Shibajie large mahua was two or three cun bigger than Northeastern large mahua, and the mahua strands were a ring thicker; in the gaps between the strands were stuck green threads, red threads, rock sugar chunks, sesame seeds, peanut kernels and so on, looking brightly colored and quite rich and elaborate. The greatest advantage of this kind of mahua is that it satisfies a craving. I never ate the kind fried and sold on the spot; what I ate was the kind in exquisite gift boxes, usually two to a box. Biting into it, it was crisp and flaky, and you had to cup your hand underneath, as crumbs sometimes fell. The taste was fragrant and rich, and usually at most I could eat half a piece.

There is also a kind of fried small mahua, which should be similar to a pastry-type food, about a zha long. After this small mahua is fried, it is rolled in a layer of granulated sugar and placed on trays for sale in markets and shops. Because the mahua strands are thin and small and soaked through with oil when fried, it is completely crisp when eaten; sometimes after being left a long time it becomes a bit hard. Used to pass the time chewing, it is quite a good leisure snack for killing boredom.

I remember also eating a kind of honey and brown sugar mahua, wrapped on the outside with dark honey and a sugar coating; one bite was a little sticky to the teeth, while the dough center inside was flaky. It had only the name of mahua and was in fact an out-and-out leisure dessert, not something that could serve as a staple food. Apart from breakfast stalls in morning markets, there are now few large mahua stalls frying and selling on the street; even where they are sold, the taste differs greatly from the original.

The tidied, uniform, formatted life is slowly smoothing away all the warm and flavorful imprints of traditional life. I very much miss those times of frying and eating on the spot, taking a bite of crisp, soft, fragrant large mahua just out of the wok, chewing over that leisurely and unhurried time. These thoughts arise of themselves, impossible to avoid, and are somehow a deep, nameless temptation that makes me long for them again and again; tasting it carefully, there is even a touch of world-weariness.