MUZIChinese Matrix
Guangxi Cuisine · FFET10154
Yangshuo's beer fish: river fish fried, then simmered in beer with tomato; a modern dish that grew up with local tourism.
A deep oval white porcelain plate holds a whole pan-fried river fish in glossy sauce, with red tomato wedges, green pepper strips, scallion and ginger, with chopsticks resting beside the plate at lower right, angled up right.
The regional cooking of Guangxi, known for rice noodles, glutinous rice and oil tea.
Guilin beer fish is found mostly on West Street and nearby lanes in Yangshuo county. River fish is fried, then simmered with beer, tomato and chilies. Its characterization as a modern dish that emerged with Yangshuo's tourism, rather than an old one, rests on an interviewee's recollection in a 2020 paper. A March 7, 2024 report records that the founder of Xie Dajie Beer Fish began a stall on Diecui Road in 1993, when customers were mostly local.
Beer fish is a river-fish dish. It uses live carp from the Li River, cut into pieces with the scales left on, fried in local camellia oil, then simmered with Guilin beer, chilies, tomato and celery until about 20% of the sauce remains.4
The available evidence comes from an interview in a 2020 paper and a March 7, 2024 report, without primary records establishing an origin date or creator. This account places beer fish in the modern tourist era: it did not exist before Yangshuo's tourism developed, and local restaurants previously made yellow-braised fish. The founder of Xie Dajie Beer Fish began a stall on Diecui Road in 1993, when customers were mostly local. West Street tourism grew around 1999.1,2
Guilin beer fish is a signature dish of Yangshuo, found mainly around West Street and neighboring Diecui Road in Yangshuo county.1,2,4
Live carp of 1 to 1.5 kg is cut into pieces without scaling, fried golden in local camellia oil, then simmered with Guilin beer, chilies, tomato and celery. The beer mainly keeps the flesh tender.2,4
For restaurants, this was a way to offer visitors a local dish made from nearby ingredients: Li River fish and local beer.2
As of March 7, 2024, Xie Dajie Beer Fish had 9 shops and had sold over 220,000 kg in 2023. In May 2019, West Street had 13 chain shops. In June 2023, nearly every restaurant on West Street served the dish.1,2,3
Legend has it that someone drinking at a restaurant accidentally spilled beer into a pot of fish. The fish tasted better, and local restaurant owners began selling fish cooked in beer.
Told in: An oral tale from Yangshuo's West Street, retold by an interviewee in the 2020 Human Geography paper. The paper gives no date and no name.
Grandma Li
This is a simplified home version, not the traditional restaurant method.
This is the simpler way I make it at home. I use a white-fleshed fish that is easy to buy, not live Li River carp, and no camellia oil, so it comes close to the Yangshuo way but is not the same. The two published recipes I looked at were both adapted for other fish. The amounts of fish, beer, tomato and pepper roughly follow one of the recipes, and the frying and simmering times are my own choices at home.
Allergens: fish, soy, wheat
