🍽️ Fuyang Gelatiao

Thick noodles with sesame paste.

Fuyang Gelatiao is the signature noodle of Fuyang, Anhui, a hearty northern-Anhui staple of carbohydrates. A firm dough of flour and salt water is pressed through a special metal extruder straight into boiling water, yielding thick, round, springy noodles similar in chew to a coarse cold-skin noodle. They are tossed with sesame paste, chili oil, mashed garlic, shredded cucumber and cilantro, finished with aged vinegar. The taste is richly sesame-savory with a springy noodle bite, tangy and spicy and generously portioned. It is the most common quick lunch on Fuyang streets, with vendors extruding, scooping and saucing in one fluid motion, and one bowl is deeply filling. To locals, gelatiao is not refined food but the substantial, everyday bowl they cannot live without.