Anyone visiting Guiyang, in southwestern China, this summer, will miss the coolness and the entertainment of the National Ethnic Games, but that doesn't mean you'll lose out entirely because there are still its delicious snacks - one of its most memorable features in fact.

You can spend a summer night in this capital of Guizhou province roaming along the food stalls and tasting scores of such street eats as barbecues meat and other local snacks, while washing it down with an icy bottle of beer.

One of these is Siwawa, literally "baby threads", because it is thought to look like a newborn baby in swaddling clothes. The "clothes" part is actually a thin pancake, which is used to "swaddle" some shredded vegetables such as turnips, bean sprouts and cucumbers. You choose the stuffing from nearly 20 items and dip the rolled siwawa in sweet and sour sauce.

Another popular local dish is fried tofu balls, which were invented by a woman named Lei, about 70 years ago. The brown balls are dipped in a mixture of soy sauce, chilis, benne oil, and vinegar. The surface is crispy while the inside is soft. Premier Zhou Enlai said he enjoyed these tofu balls during a visit to Guiyang in 1960.

Anyone visiting Huaxi Park which has many types of flowers and interesting stones, can drop by one famous place, the Huaxi beef noodle shop. Often you have to wait in line just to get a bowl of rice noodles covered with sliced beef, for the astonishingly low price of 7.5 yuan ($1.2). But, it's worth the wait: The soup is thick and appetizing, the noodles are smooth and sticky, and the beef is fresh and tender. You can add a touch of red chili powder if you like, or garlic, salt, vinegar, or soy sauce.

Guiyang is known for its spicy food, which is typical of that part of China, but, for the diehard fans of sweeter foods, there are also plenty of choices.

One of these is the lotus leaf sticky rice cake. The sticky rice is first cooked by steaming then stir fried and made to look like a lotus leave by using a pancake spatula to give it some wrinkles. It has a stuffing of sesame, peanuts, and walnuts.

The popular glutinous porridge is actually made of lotus root starch and some glutinous rice, with a sprinkling of sesame seeds, melon seeds and peanuts. The sticky cake-like substance is mixed with transparent jelly for full enjoyment.

And, last but not least, you need to try Guiyang's tangyuan, boiled glutinous rice balls, which come with more than a dozen types of stuffing such as dates, cherries, and rose petals.

(China Daily 09/20/2011 page22)