What to eat this month
Shenzhen is a city of migrants, and its three food lines — Hakka, Chaoshan and Cantonese / Hong Kong — are on the table in every month: yum cha in the morning, a Hakka table at lunch, Chaoshan beef hotpot or coconut chicken at night. The calendar sits around them. Winter belongs to Shajing oysters and the Golden Oyster Festival, with poon choi and Hakka rice cakes around the Spring Festival; from spring into summer come the cream crabs of Fuyong, Nan'ao sea urchin and the Nanshan lychees; in summer the dessert shops add herbal jelly and iced mung-bean soup. From roughly June to October is typhoon season: check the warnings before the long drive to the Nan'ao and Dapeng seafood streets. The month shown is today's date in Beijing; the dishes below link to the must-eat list, where each one says where to get it.
Twelve monthsChina time today: Oct
Deep winter, the middle of the oyster season: charcoal-grilled and crisp-fried oysters in Shajing, and the Golden Oyster Festival running into early January. Pork-tripe chicken is the winter hotpot. Dried oysters go into the New Year dish 蚝豉发菜, and Hakka families make rice cakes for the Spring Festival, which can fall at the end of the month — when some small shops close for days.
Spring Festival usually falls here: Hakka rice cakes, dried oysters for 蚝豉发菜, and restaurant poon choi, which is most on offer before the New Year. Around the Lantern Festival the Huang clan of Xiasha village lays out its poon-choi banquet — a clan event, watch or go by invitation. Last month of the oyster season. Some small shops close for days over the holiday.
The oysters are over. The Lantern Festival — and with it the Xiasha poon-choi banquet — can fall early in the month. Hakka rice cakes are made again in the run-up to Qingming at the start of April; the festival weeks are the easiest time to find them in Kuichong.
Two seasons open: Fuyong cream crab (April to October by the city's own dish standard) on vermicelli in a clay pot, and Nan'ao sea urchin, fattest from the third to the fifth lunar month — sea-urchin fried rice by the sea. Qingming falls early in the month, with Hakka rice cakes.
Sea urchin at its fattest, and urchin zongzi-making picks up from the eighth day of the fourth lunar month towards the Dragon Boat Festival. Cream crab is in season. From the end of the month, watch the Nanshan district site and the orchards' WeChat official accounts for the lychee-picking announcements.
Lychee month: Feizixiao from early June, nuomici and guiwei from mid-June, picked in Nanshan's orchards inside the city. The last month of the urchin season, and the Dragon Boat Festival often falls here — the end of the urchin-zongzi peak. Cream crab goes on. Summer at the dessert shop: herbal jelly, iced mung-bean soup. Typhoon season begins — check the warnings before driving to Nan'ao.
The lychees end in early July. Summer desserts — herbal jelly, iced mung-bean soup on a hot afternoon — and cream crab in a clay pot. Typhoon season: seaside venues may close under a yellow warning and must close under an orange one.
High summer: the same table as July without the lychees — herbal jelly and iced mung-bean soup, Fuyong cream crab. Typhoon season is at its height; plan the Nan'ao and Dapeng seafood trip around the forecast.
No new seasonal item this month: cream crab is still in season, and typhoon season still runs. Mid-Autumn usually falls here and has no Shenzhen dish on our list. Eat the fixed must-eats: yum cha in the morning, a Hakka table at lunch, Chaoshan beef hotpot at night, a sweet soup late.
The last month of the cream-crab season, and roughly the end of typhoon season. Otherwise no particular seasonal item — eat the fixed must-eats: dim sum, salt-baked chicken, beef hotpot by the cut, coconut chicken when the table can't agree.
The oyster season starts: Shajing oysters, fattest in winter, grilled or crisp-fried. The Golden Oyster Festival dates are usually only announced in mid-December, so check before planning around it.
Winter proper: the Golden Oyster Festival opens in mid-to-late December in Shajing and runs to New Year's Day or into early January. Pork-tripe chicken for the cold nights; bags of dried oysters to take home. The winter solstice is one of the days Hakka families make rice cakes.
Each month lists only what is in season; the year-round essentials (Braised-then-fried pigeon — Guangming and Dameisha · Cantonese yum cha and the Hong Kong café — Shenzhen's breakfast · Chaoshan food — beef hotpot, braised goose, claypot congee · Hakka food — salt-baked chicken, stuffed tofu, the Hakka stir-fry) count in any month. A peak is not an exclusivity rule — availability varies by shop.