Sweet Potato Chips

Sweet Potato Chips

　　In my hometown of Huangmei, there is a rustic and unpretentious local specialty made primarily from sweet potatoes, which we all call "shuguo'er" (sweet potato chips). In the past, during the lunar month of December, almost every household in the countryside would pick an auspicious day to make them.

　　"Hongshu" is the local term for sweet potatoes. Due to the good soil quality in the Dushan area of Shangxiang in Huangmei, the sweet potatoes grown there are large and sweet. Locals process them into sweet potato starch, which then serves as the main ingredient for various foods. For example, it can be used to make fish noodles, sweet potato starch sheets, and sweet potato chips.

　　In Huangmei, sweet potato chips are generally made in two ways: one is roasted with fine sand, and the other is deep-fried. The methods differ, and so do the flavors.

　　For the sand-roasted sweet potato chips, the sweet potatoes are cut into strips, dried in the sun, and then roasted together with clean fine sand in an iron pot. Once they become crispy, the sand is filtered out using a sieve.

　　The deep-fried sweet potato chips are even sweeter. The sweet potatoes are peeled, steamed until soft, mashed, and then mixed with sesame seeds and white sugar. The mixture is spread out evenly to dry in the sun. Once dried, it is cut into small slices or pieces. For frying, we usually use rapeseed oil over a low flame.

　　When I was a child, there were no snacks at home, nothing was sold in the streets, and we didn’t have any pocket money. So the only treats we could have were those “preserved winter foods” made during the lunar December. Candied sweet potatoes, peanuts, and sweet potato chips were all delicacies that we didn’t normally have but looked forward to during the New Year—they made our mouths water just looking at them.

　　I remember that every lunar December, my mother would choose a sunny day to make sweet potato chips. Early in the morning, before dawn, she would first stoke the fire in the stove, then steam the washed sweet potatoes in a steamer basket. Once steamed, the skins were removed, and at this point, some black sesame seeds and white sugar were added, and the mixture was spread into a pancake shape. Finally, it was cut into strips or diamond shapes. Some were set out to dry in the sun, while others were deep-fried in oil. We kids either helped with stoking the fire or cutting the sweet potato chips.

　　The freshly fried sweet potato chips were golden yellow. The moment you put one in your mouth—before even swallowing—the sweet, delicious flavor would shoot straight from your throat to your heart and lungs. Back then, cooking oil was rationed and in very short supply. On normal days, our family wouldn’t use even an extra drop of oil for cooking. But during the lunar December, when making deep-fried sweet potato chips, my mother would go all out and use a whole pot of oil. That was also the time of year when we got to enjoy the most oil-rich food. Eating those sweet and tasty sweet potato chips, we little ones even came to believe that the most delicious food in the world was none other than Huangmei’s sweet potato chips.

　　Nowadays, living conditions have improved, the quality of life has gotten better, and there are more and more delicious foods available. But no matter how much we eat, we can never quite recapture the authenticity and aroma of the sweet potato chips from our childhood.

　　Source: Huangmei County People's Government Website, Cao Jinjun's "Warm Hearth" column. Author: Cao Jinjun