Quxia town, located in Taixing city in East China's Jiangsu province, is well-known for its crab-roe soup dumplings – a pastry delicacy with crab roe and soup inside.
Quxia crab-roe soup dumplings have a thin and soft skin and the filling soup is clear, thick and tasty. When having them, people need to move slowly and gently lift them, then nibble them to suck up the soup.
Close to the Yangtze River, Quxia town has ample resources for making its crab-roe soup dumplings. Every year when autumn comes, the dish becomes a hot favorite as the fresh crabs come onto market.
The whole process of making them involves 33 steps. Taking the selection of crab roe and crab meat as an example, this process includes 10 steps. For example, just one consideration is that the crab must be a healthy Yangtze River mitten crab with a net weight of 100 grams or more and must be female.
At present, there are five "century-old" crab-roe soup dumplings stores in Quxia town. Generations of Quxia people have inherited the skill of making them and have also adapted the dish to suit modern tastes.
The ancient stores now sell quick-frozen crab-roe soup dumplings to solve the transportation problem, enabling the authentic delicacy to be sent all over the world.