Rice Rolls for Breakfast

Rise and shine, passengers! For breakfast today, you have two options: Chinese breakfast or a Western breakfast. The difference is a Chinese breakfast is only savory, and a Western breakfast can be sweet or savory. Think waffles, pancakes, sausages, eggs. A Chinese breakfast can be a glass of soya milk, congee, fried noodles with soya sauce, or glutinous rice rolls （粢飯）, pictured below.

The rice is glutinous so it's sticky, a bit like the rice in sushi. The filling is pork floss (豬肉松）, fried dough stick (油條）and pickled vegetables（榨菜). And I went to a famous place for it in Causway Bay on Jardine's Bazaar. It's a Shanghainese eatery on a small side street that has signs all over advertising their famous piping hot rice rolls. I was looking for something to eat for lunch that I could carry in my hand and eat while I walk, and a rice roll was perfect for the occasion. They make their rice rolls fresh at lunchtime and breakfast time, and it's so piping hot that I felt it was going to melt the cling film. The big pot behind the rice rolls is hot soya milk, I prefer it cold and sweetened in summertime.

Last summer on my way to work, I'd buy one at the corner shop and bring it to the office. I love the texture of the rice, it's not mushy or soft but chewy. The filling is only mildly salty and doesn't taste too overpowering for the morning. The one thing is, it's a little too filling for breakfast. It gives me food coma for the rest of the morning because it's literally one bowl of rice, and glutinous rice is usually more starchy and filling than regular rice. I've never seen rice rolls being made, so I stuck around and asked the two ladies if I could take some photos. They worked together, one rolled and the other wrapped cling film. Just like how you make sushi, you need strong hands to shape the rice.

If you're a curious epicurean interested in knowing how your food is made then you should visit this eatery. You can watch the two ladies roll and pack, before they nudge you for getting in the way of their business. The rice roll is HKD$11, a bit pricey since it's their top selling item, but if you go to other breakfast places you can get it for around HKD$8. That's only around USD$1, just imagine, a delicious USD$1 meal!

Bon voyage,
Jenny Cheng