🍽️ Candied Hawthorn

Hawthorn sticks in hard sugar coating, sweet and tart street snack.

Candied Hawthorn is a traditional winter street snack of Beijing and northern China, made by dipping skewered hawthorns in sugar coating. Fresh hawthorns are pitted, threaded on bamboo sticks and quickly swirled in hot boiled sugar syrup, which cools into a thin, crisp transparent shell. The first bite cracks the shell to reveal bright, tart hawthorn inside — sweet-sour, refreshing and appetite-lifting. Besides hawthorn, yam, mandarin orange, strawberry and grape versions are common. In old Beijing winters, vendors carried straw poles strung with candied haws through hutongs, an iconic sight. Crisp, tart, cool and sweet, it is a seasonal fair and Spring Festival treat and a nostalgic taste of old Beijing hutong life.