China Food & Drinks

“Zang Zang Bao” – The Hype Surrounding Beijing’s “Dirty Dirty” Chocolate Bread

Being dirty has never been this sweet.

Published

4 years ago

January 29, 2018

The so-called ‘Zang Zang Bao’ (Dirty Dirty Bread) has become a hype in Beijing and beyond. Showing off one’s chocolate-covered face after eating the pastry is the latest online fad. Even with minus ten degrees, crowds of people are queuing up for their piece of dirty bread.

Those who have wandered around downtown Shanghai or Beijing’s Sanlitun recently might have noticed the long queues of people in front of various bakeries and tea shops, wondering what’s so special about their tea or sandwiches. But it is not the tea and sandwiches people are waiting for in the freezing cold – it is their dirty dirty chocolate bread.

“Zang zang bao” (脏脏包), literally meaning “dirty dirty bread”, has become an online craze in China over the past few months. The Chinese chocolate croissant was already named “one of the most popular baked goods in China in 2017” by CGTN (CCTV International) in December, but the social media hype over the bread has carried on well into 2018 and is now making it to the top trending topics on Weibo.

The bread’s name comes from the fact that it actually looks dirty and that is virtually impossible to eat the snack without getting messy. Containing large amounts of chocolate, cream, and cocoa powder, people eating this bread are bound to end up with chocolate stains all over; which is one of the main reasons that sparked the online craze for it in the first place.

Hundreds of people – specifically young women – are recently posting photos of themselves on Wechat and Weibo eating the bread and then having their hands and mouths covered in chocolate, triggered by celebrities and online influencers (KOL) who have previously done the same. Showing off their chocolate-covered faces is another way of being ‘cute’ and playful.

The bread’s recipe originally comes from the Japanese version of the chocolate croissant, and first started gaining attention in China when a Beijing bakery named Bad Farmers & Our Bakery started selling the pastry at limited hours during the afternoons in 2017.

According to the online media platform AI Finance (AI财经社), the trend then blew over to Shanghai, where LeLe Tea (乐乐茶) started selling the buns in June of 2017 with much success – within six months, the tearoom franchise was able to open four additional shops in Shanghai.

The Zang Zang Bao success has now triggered teashops across China to sell their own version of the popular bread. A shop of a franchise called HeyTea (喜茶) in Sanlitun, Beijing, is gathering large crowds of people who are curious to try out its “dirty bread”.

The spokesperson of HeyTea, however, denied to AI Finance that its company has become an ‘internet hype.’ In the end, many companies dislike becoming a ‘hype’, which suggests that there is a peek of interest which will soon blow over. Companies such as HeyTea hope that the Zang Zang Bao will not be a “short-lived glory” but a classic item on their menus.

On January 29, Zhejiang University warned on Weibo (@浙江大学) that fans of the bread should not eat their favorite new snack too often: one roll of Zang Zang Bao holds no less than 450 kilocalories.

But many netizens do not seem to care too much about the calories: “It’s only two bowls of rice,” some said: “I’ve already bought another dirty bread today!”

There are also others, however, who do not understand what all the fuss is about: “What’s so delicious about this stuff?”, one netizen wonders: “It indeed tastes as if it is stuffed with dirt.”

By Manya Koetse
Follow @whatsonweibo

Spotted a mistake or want to add something? Please let us know in comments below or email us.

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Manya Koetse

Manya Koetse is the editor-in-chief of www.whatsonweibo.com. She is a writer and consultant (Sinologist, MPhil) on social trends in China, with a focus on social media and digital developments, popular culture, and gender issues. Contact at manya@whatsonweibo.com, or follow on Twitter.

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China Food & Drinks

Adapted to the Desert: This Yurt-Style KFC Opened in Inner Mongolia

Special KFC in Inner-Mongolia: “Is home delivery done by camelback?”

Published

3 months ago

June 28, 2021

Manya Koetse

A KFC restaurant that has opened up in Ordos Prefecture, Inner-Mongolia, is attracting online attention in China for its yurt-style building.

The KFC restaurant is located in Xiangshawan, also known as Whistling Dune Bay, a tourist area – China’s first desert-themed tourism resort – in the Kubuqi Desert.

Some web users praise the fast-food giant for “following local customs” (“入乡随俗”). Others jokingly wonder if their home delivery services are also done by camelback.

Although KFC is not China’s first fast-food restaurant, it is one of the most popular ones. Nowhere else outside of the US has KFC expanded so quickly as in China. Since the first KFC opened in Beijing in 1987, the chain had an average of 50% growth per year.

With thousands of locations across the country, KFC often adapts its restaurants’ style to the local environment. On Weibo, web users share various examples of local KFCs.

A KFC sign at a Fuzhou branch, by Weibo user @渭城朝雨玉清宸.

A KFC in Shanxi province, shared by Weibo user @sheep加水饺.

KFC in Suzhou, by Weibo user @是宜不是宣呀.

KFC in Pingyao, by Weibo user @车谦渊

KFC in Orange Isle, Hunan, by Weibo user @DzDanger_

One Weibo user (@阳山花非花) points out that KFC is not the only chain to adapt to the local environment in Ordos. Chinese fast-food chain Dicos (德克士) apparently also has a special restaurant in the area.

Besides adapting its buildings, KFC is also known to be quite localized in its product offerings. KFC China offers products such as Chinese-style porridge, Beijing chicken roll, and youtiao (deep-fried strip of dough commonly eaten for breakfast).

In 2019, KFC also made headlines in China for adding, among other things, hot and spicy skewers (麻辣串串) to its menu.

For now, the KFC yurt-style location is bound to gain more visitors who are coming to check it out. Already, various Weibo users are sharing their own pics of their KFC visit.

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By Manya Koetse (@manyapan)

With contributions by Miranda Barnes

Follow @whatsonweibo

Spotted a mistake or want to add something? Please let us know in comments below or email us. First-time commenters, please be patient – we will have to manually approve your comment before it appears.

China Food & Drinks

“There’s a Cockroach in My Hotpot” – ‘Pengci’ Tries to Scam Haidilao Restaurant

Two hotpot cockroaches in one day, but the real cockroach didn’t get away.

Published

3 months ago

June 15, 2021

Manya Koetse

A man in Shenzhen has been arrested after trying to pull a scam in Haidilao hotpot restaurants twice in one day.

The man, Mr Cai (蔡), visited two different locations of China’s Haidilao chain of hotpot restaurants within twenty-four hours, and both times he managed to ‘discover’ a cockroach in his hotpot.

Cai complained to the staff about the roach in his food. According to Sohu.com, in order to keep the peace, both Haidilao stores compensated their unhappy guest; they gave him a free meal and 1000 yuan ($156) and 800 yuan ($124) respectively.

When the restaurants later inspected their security camera footage, they suspected they had been scammed and reported the incident to the police. Further investigation of the security videos revealed that the man actually held the cockroach in his hand, behind his phone, and dropped it on the table, after which he put it in the hotpot together with the vegetables.

When the man scooped the insect out of the hotpot, he immediately called the waiter to show the cockroach in his food.

After being exposed as a ‘pengci‘ (碰瓷), a scammer focused on pretending to a victim in order to get compensation, Cai was detained by the local police.

A similar incident occurred in 2018, when a man named Guo (郭) dropped a dead rat in the hotpot at a Haidilao restaurant, and then demanded a compensation of 5 million yuan ($780,000). That incident also went viral on Chinese social media at the time.

Guo was later sentenced to three years in prison for his scam, for damaging Haidilao’s reputation, and for filing a false report with regulatory authorities.

Also in 2018, a woman claimed she had found a sanitary pad in her Haidilao hotpot. This incident later also turned out to be a scam – the woman had placed the item there herself.

Haidilao is one of China’s most famous hotpot brands, and its restaurants have been in business for over 25 years. The restaurant is known for its good service, quality, and cleanliness.

On Weibo, the Haidilao ‘cockroach incident’ is attracting a lot of attention today, with one hashtag page regarding the issue receiving over 230 million views (#男子在海底捞自导自演吃出蟑螂#).

Although scams such as these are not uncommon, many people are surprised that someone would still attempt to fraud Haidilao in this way in 2021, when there are cameras set up everywhere in the restaurant.

Haidilao’s surveillance cameras have become a topic of discussion on social media before. The restaurant’s alleged reason for putting up so many cameras is in order to take better care of their customers, to monitor employee service standards, and to rely on their security footage when personal belongings go missing. The cameras also register the entire hotpot dining process; if something comes up in the hotpot that is not supposed to be there, the cameras will have captured how it ended up there.

“In this case, it’s good that there are so many security cameras,” one commenter writes.

Many others scold Cai for trying to scam Haidilao like this: “They should really make him eat cockroaches.”

– By Manya Koetse (@manyapan)

Follow @whatsonweibo