🍽️ Zengbeng Carp

Whole carp fried crisp and dressed with sweet-sour sauce.

Zengbeng Carp is a famous traditional Tianjin dish and a representative fish of the city's official cuisine. A fresh whole scaled carp is fried with scales on until bones are crisp and the skin curls like a leaping fish, then hot sweet-sour sauce is poured over it tableside with a sizzle. The flesh is tender while the scaly shell turns crisp, the whole fish coated in tangy glaze — crisp outside, tender within and appetizingly sweet-sour. Unlike common sweet-sour fish, the edible fried scales are its signature. Tianjin, on a river near the sea, has abundant freshwater fish, and the dish depends on frying skill and the timing of sauce. A traditional banquet star, it shows the sweet-sour-crisp style and refined official cooking of Tianjin for visitors.