Pickles · FFET10217
Sichuan paocai (Sichuan pickles)
Vegetables fermented in a brine of salt, liquor and spices in a water-sealed jar, served as a sour, crisp side dish.
A round white china plate has drained orange carrot, pickled pepper, pale cabbage, daikon chunks, red radish slices, peppercorns, star anise, bay, scallion, cilantro and garlic, with wood chopsticks resting beside the plate.
Vegetables kept by salting or fermenting: sour cabbage, brined pickles and salted greens.
Sichuan paocai is made by fermenting seasonal vegetables such as radish and cabbage in a brine of salt, liquor, sugar and spices, with the jar sealed by a water moat; it is a side dish at Sichuan and Chongqing banquets and is also used as an ingredient. Meishan, Su Shi’s hometown, is known as the China pickle city and ships over 400 metric tons daily as of December 2025. A 2018 account traces written records of pickling in Sichuan back over 1,500 years; a 2019 account traces Meishan’s old-jar pickling craft to the Song. Both are secondhand claims, and no dated original text was found.
What
Sichuan paocai is made by washing and drying seasonal vegetables and fermenting them in a brine of salt, liquor, sugar and spices, with the jar sealed by a water moat around its mouth. It is sour and crisp, and serves as a side dish at Sichuan and Chongqing tables and as an ingredient.1,4,5,6
When
A 2018 account traces pickling in Sichuan back more than 1,500 years; a 2019 account links the Meishan craft to the Song and Su Shi, citing Su Dongpo’s Dongpo Geng Song. These are secondhand claims: no year is given for Dongpo Geng Song, and the listed sources contain no dated original text. The Eastern Han Shuowen Jiezi defines zu (pickled vegetables), and the Northern Wei Qimin Yaoshu describes pickling, providing general background on Chinese pickling.1,2,4
Where
Sichuan and Chongqing. Meishan is Su Shi’s hometown and, as of December 2025, a main production center known as the China pickle city. The old-jar craft in Dongpo District, Meishan, is documented in 2019.1,2,3
How
The brine uses about 60 g of salt per liter of water, with a little liquor, rock sugar and Sichuan pepper; the vegetables go in washed and dry, and the water moat is kept full. Cabbage and carrot are ready in about 2 to 4 days and roots in about 5 to 7; the brine can be kept and topped up with water and salt. The 2 recipes use about 6% salt by weight of the water.5,6
Why
Paocai goes with rice and is believed to help with hangovers and greasy food, though the listed material gives no basis for this belief.1,4
Impact and influence
As of December 2025, Meishan ships over 400 metric tons of pickles daily, its pickle supply chain is valued at 22 billion yuan, and one producer makes over 20,000 metric tons annually. The claim that Meishan led an international pickle standard does not name the relevant body.3
No tale about this food has been found.
Grandma Li
This is a simplified home version, not the traditional restaurant method.
This is my home version of Sichuan paocai, with amounts following the recipe by a named author on a recipe blog that gives gram weights for everything: 1 liter of water with 60 g of salt, plus liquor, rock sugar, pickled peppers and Sichuan pepper. Another named author’s version uses a plain naturally fermented brine with no pickled peppers, and I put it in the tips. That recipe advises that for pickling the jar and tools should be clean and dry, the vegetables should be dried, and hands and oil should be kept out of the jar.
Ingredients
- Boiled and cooled water, or bottled water 1 liter
- Pickling salt without iodine 60 g
- High-proof liquor (over 50 percent alcohol) 20 g
- Rock sugar 20 g
- Store-bought pickled peppers 15
- Pickled-pepper brine 40 g
- Sichuan peppercorns 4 g
- Star anise and bay leaves 2 g star anise and 3 bay leaves, optional
- Scallion 1 stalk, about 10 g
- Cilantro 10 g
- Garlic 4 cloves, peeled
- Carrots 100 g, peeled
- Small red radishes 4, unpeeled
- White radish (daikon) 200 g, peeled
- Cabbage 100 g
- Ginger 50 g, peeled
- Celery 40 g
Steps
- Peel the garlic, ginger, white radish and carrots; wash the celery, cabbage, red radishes, cilantro and scallion; pat everything dry with a clean cloth so it goes in clean and dry.
- Cut the white radish, carrots and celery into pieces about the size of a baby carrot, cut the cabbage into wedges, and keep the ginger whole or cut it to about the size of a red radish.
- Dissolve the 60 g of salt completely in the 1 liter of water.
- Put the vegetables in a clean pickling jar, then add the pickled peppers, pickled-pepper brine, Sichuan pepper, rock sugar and garlic, and the star anise and bay leaves if using.
- Tie the scallion and cilantro into a bundle and tuck it under the narrow neck of the jar to keep the vegetables under the surface. Pour in the salted water to cover everything and add the 20 g of liquor.
- Fill the water moat, put on the lid and keep the jar at room temperature in a cool, dark place for 2 days. Keep the moat filled and never let it dry out.
- After 2 days, take out the scallion, cilantro and garlic with clean chopsticks. The cabbage and carrots are ready to eat; leafy vegetables such as cabbage should not stay in the brine more than 2 days.
- Radishes and carrots are ready after about 5 days and should not stay in the brine longer than 7. Once the vegetables are out, the jar can go in the refrigerator, still with the moat filled; the peppers and ginger can stay in the brine for up to 3 months, according to the recipe.
Tips
- That recipe says that if white mold appears on the brine, a splash of high-proof liquor can be added. It writes over 50 percent alcohol in the ingredient list and over 60 percent in its tips, which do not agree, so I read the label and pick a stronger liquor.
- The other named author’s version uses only salt, sugar and liquor, with no pickled peppers: for each cup of water (about 236 g), 14 to 16 g of salt, 4 g of sugar and 4 g of liquor, in a clean, dry jar with the moat filled, and fermentation starts after 3 to 4 days. It advises keeping the vegetables under the brine to avoid mold, and discarding anything that smells rotten.