Before talking about the Lanjiang river tapertail anchovy in depth, let’s hear an old story first.

One day very early in the morning, Yang Qingsong, an old fisherman in Lanxi, was fishing in the estuary of the Wujiang River, the Qujiang River and the Lanjiang River and caught three small fish in one net. The fish were long and slender, with thin anal fins and a silvery glint. They looked familiar to Yang, who just could not name them right away. Out of professional sensitivity, he took a picture of the fish, with which he then consulted an aquatic expert. The mystery was solved: the tapertail anchovy was back!

This piece of inspiring news was reported in September 2020. A few months later, a reporter from Zhejiang Daily accidently heard about it, sensed its value and wrote a long follow-up report for the front page of Zhejiang Daily on January 3, 2021.

Fishing along the Lanjiang River

Yet the return of tapertail anchovy into the clear water of the Lanjiang River is nothing accidental. Thanks to Zhejiang’s “Five Water Governance Plan” initiated in November 2013, the province’s water governance has been effectively improved since eight years ago, so has been the water ecology of the entire Qiantang River basin.

But how many readers will continue to actually care about the return of the tapertail anchovy, after the news quickly faded away?

The other day, a colleague suddenly asked me: “Have you ever eaten tapertail anchovy?” “I just don’t have the luck,” I answered. I have never seen a real tapertail anchovy, but I ate canned anchovies sold in stores before, and the anchovy printed on the trademark looked very similar to tapertail anchovy.

Anchovies are mostly produced in Chongming and Baoshan of Shanghai, and are caught between mid-May and the end of June. The fish is about four inches long and full of roe, crispy and delicious when fried with oil. And for tapertail anchovy, although it is a close relative to anchovy, the former tastes better and costs much higher because the two kinds of fish live in different waters.

The Lanjiang River is an important tributary of the Qiantang River, connecting with the Wujiang River and the Qujiang River at the upstream, and the Fuchun River at the downstream. Although not a part of the Yangtze River system, it entually flows into the East China Sea as well. Therefore, the Lanjiang river tapertail anchovy and the Yangtze River tapertail anchovy are of the same species.

The beautiful scenery of Hengshan Mountain

Unfortunately, tapertail anchovy is very sensitive to the environment of the migratory route. As early as 30 or 40 years ago, due to the pollution and repeated dredging of the bottom sand, it has been increasingly difficult to find tapertail anchovy in the Lanjiang river.

The fish was highly valued and praised by people of the Qing dynasty (1616-1911) as “the most delicious dish of spring”, and it is quite seasonal — usually caught before the Qingming Festival, its texture is extremely tender and the bones soft, but after that the texture and the bones will become harder, hence less tasty.

To clean a tapertail anchovy, you don’t have to cut open its belly but only need to stick a chopstick through one of its gills and roll out the intestines, leaving the fish intact. It seems an easy preparation — if you can actually nail it.

Tapertail anchovy soup noodles

According to my cooking experience, there are only a few ways to cook tapertail anchovy, such as braising with soy sauce, steaming and deep-frying. But after browsing through relevant literature, I realize that there are so many other ways out there. For example, Yuan Mei (1716-1798), a famous Qing poet, loved to eat steamed tapertail anchovy. Ni Shengzhong (1845-1919), another Qing poet, recommended to use tapertail anchovy meat for filling fish meat pies. Wang Zengqi (1920-1997), a well-known contemporary Chinese writer, suggested that tapertail anchovy could be fully stewed to make fish soup noodles.

Unfortunately, most tasty river fishes have a lot of bones, which is especially true with tapertail anchovy. Its intimidating number of bones almost makes northerners (who are not used to eating bony river fish) hesitate before they finally decide to have a try — after all, the extremely tender texture is so irresistible.

Being bony is perhaps one of the unappealing features of tapertail anchovy, but it is exactly the same feature that makes its meat taste all the more delicious. If there are no bones, the tender meat will be swallowed without being chewed thoroughly, and that makes it almost impossible for people to fully savor what the meat exactly tastes like. Thanks to those soft bones, people have to slow down to lick and sip, enjoying the tender texture and the lingering flavor with their taste buds.

How do Lanxi folks cook tapertail anchovy? Chen Jinfa, who has been fishing in the Lanjiang River for more than 40 years, told us that in the 1950s and 1960s, tapertail anchovy in the Lanjiang river were mainly concentrated in the lower reaches of the mud flat, and the fishing time was around the Qingming Festival. Tapertail anchovy meat is tender in texture with a lot bones that are soft enough to avoid being stuck in even a child’s throat. As for the cooking method, city people like to steam it, while fishermen tend to keep it simple by putting it to boil, and dipping it in soy sauce after it is done. Some people prefer to spread pieces of tapertail anchovy meat on top of the rice to be cooked together. When the rice is cooked, the fish will also be cooked to the point that its meat just falls off the bones naturally, giving off a nice aroma — that is one potful of happiness.

A statue of Li Yu

Li Yu (1611-1680), the sage of Lanxi, knew well about the Lanjiang River tapertail anchovy and certainly must have eaten many. According to him, you could grow tired of eating other fishes, but tapertail anchovy is the only kind of fish that “the more you chew, the more sweetness you will taste and you just can’t stop eating until there is absolutely no room in your stomach.”  

Editor:Huang Yan