On the trail of silver shrimps
One of the four biggest fishing villages in Hong Kong before World War II, Tai O offers quality live prawns and shrimp paste, writes Alan Teh Leam Seng
“PLOP!” The live shrimp suddenly jumps up in front of my face, executes a perfect somersault in the air and lands back into its styrofoam box.
The final aerial flick of its reddish yellow tail showers me with fine saltwater droplets. I take off my glasses and start to wipe them within the folds of my shirt.
“Do not stand too near or another one will do the same to you!” a female voice calls out beside me. I take a step back and thank the young woman for her advice.
We soon strike up a conversation and I find out that she is Marian Yeung who works at the nearby Tai O Heritage Hotel.
Marian is taking two of her hotel guests on an excursion to introduce them to the local shrimp paste industry.
Noticing my interest in the crustacean, Marian generously invites me to join her group. I immediately jump at her offer. I have just arrived at Tai O minutes earlier and do not have any fixed agenda.
Initially I only planned to just walk around Tai O village, take a few photographs and purchase some local delicacies before jumping on the next bus back to Kowloon. TANKA PEOPLE
Marian’s invitation is a golden opportunity to gain access to the lesser known parts of the village.
I learn from Marian that the prawn that drenched me is of the local variety called the silver shrimp.
These highly sought after shrimps are found in abundance in the Pearl River Delta.
Apart from being the main ingredient in making shrimp paste, the Cantonese in Hong Kong use it in a variety of their dishes, either in the fresh or dried form.
The live ones that I just saw earlier are just steamed whole together with a mixture of garlic, chilies and lemon grass. The result is a succulent tender flesh while the broth is slightly fiery and sweet.
“People come from all over to buy the live prawns in Tai O as they are renowned to be of the highest quality,” Marian adds before showing our group the way to the passenger ferry terminal.
The 10-minute walk takes us through a narrow alley flanked on both sides by traditional stilt houses.
These are the homes of the Tanka people, a community of fisher-folk who have made the tidal flats of Lantau Island their home for generations.
These unique homes are built very close to each other with hardly any gaps between them. It is best to walk with caution as bicycles, which is the main mode of transportation in the village, can zip past without any prior warning.
The passenger ferry terminal is located next to the only manually operated drawbridge in the village.
The bridge spans the narrow creek which divides the town. Back in the early days, villagers had to depend on a rope-drawn ferry to traverse this narrow waterway.
The rope-drawn ferry was discontinued when several people lost their lives some 60 years ago. Prior to that unfortunate incident, continuous downpour had caused the creek to swell to three times its normal size.
The fast-flowing currents then rocked the ferry so violently that several villagers fell into the water and drowned.
Our ride on the 10-seater ferry is smooth and pleasant. While crossing the Tai O estuary I manage to see several fishing boats heading back to the village.
I wonder if they are bringing back more silver shrimps to satisfy the demands of the shrimp paste producers.
We then turn our attention to Marian as she gestures towards a white building on the hill in front of us.
“That is the Tai O Heritage Hotel. It used to be the old Tai O Police Station. In the past, policemen manning the lighthouse and watch towers had to remain vigilant against constant pirate attacks,” Marian regales us as the boatman makes his final approach to the landing platform.
I see several anglers at the landing platform waiting patiently for the fish to bite. One of them is just about to put a small silver shrimp on his hook.
Wow! I just discovered another use for this amazingly versatile crustacean. I leave the anglers and catch up with the group as they trace the coast on a narrow cement footpath.
FOLLOW THE SMELL
Halfway into the walk the air begins to smell different. My olfactory cells detect a slightly pungent aroma which reminds me of the belacan (shrimp paste) I use at home to make my favourite sambal or pounded chilli paste.
A few minutes later we arrive at a cluster of double-storey houses. The compound is filled with hundreds of blue plastic tubs. Marian goes off in search of the owner while the rest of us decide to do a bit of exploration of our own. Soon she reappears with a camera-shy couple who happily gives us a tour of the place.
Shrimp paste features prominently in many Cantonese seafood and vegetable dishes. Like many condiments in the Chinese kitchen like fermented soybeans, the shrimp paste is often used in small amounts.
Do not let the miniscule quantity deceive you as it has a huge effect on the dish. I still remember reading James Clavell’s 1962 novel King Rat which tells of British prisoners of war using bits of shrimp paste to flavour countless bowls of plain rice.
Apart from giving taste to otherwise bland food, shrimp paste is also rich in protein and minerals. This gave the detainees much-needed supplements to their otherwise poor prison food diet.
During the tour, we find out that Tai O used to be one of the four biggest fishing villages in Hong Kong before World War II.
It contributed nearly a quarter of the colony’s seafood supply. Refrigeration then was only limited to the wealthy. As a result, the fishermen use large quantities of sea salt to preserve their catch.
The shrimp paste production together with salted fish industry in the past were very communal in nature.
Almost everyone in the village were involved. The children earned quite a bit of pocket money when they helped to remove the fish scales and spread out the seafood to dry under the sun.
Things are very different today. While there were many shrimp paste factories in Tai O in the past, only a handful remain today. The main challenges faced are the lack of manpower and dwindling supply of silver shrimps.
“This industry no longer appeals to the young. They prefer their nice office attire and enjoy the air conditioned working environment in the city. They do not want to slave under the hot sun,” says Marian as she fluently translates her conversation with the couple from Cantonese to English.
The supply of silver shrimps began dwindling rapidly since the government banned trawling in a move to encourage sustainable fishing.
Today the local fishermen only depend on seine nets to catch these crustaceans in the shallow coastal waters but the yield using this technique is low.
PASTE OR BLOCK?
The best times to look for silver shrimps in the waters off Hong Kong are from the months of May to September. The fishermen try to catch as many of these prawns as they can during this period and refrigerate them for future use.
Apart from shrimp paste the villagers also produce shrimp paste block. The differences between the two are quite distinct. Shrimp paste contains more water, has a less intense flavour and involves a less complicated process to make.
The shrimp paste block, on the other hand, is much drier. The lower water content gives it a more intense and sharper flavour. The process in making shrimp paste block is more complicated. Furthermore, everything needs to be completed within one day.
The laborious shrimp paste block making process begins at the crack of dawn when the prawns are ground with sea salt into a fine paste. The brownish red paste is then spread out on flat bamboo baskets to dry in the sun.
The paste is turned over repeatedly to speed up the drying process. The villagers depend heavily on instinct and the local weather forecast to predict a clear sunny day for the process to be successful. At the end of the day, the blocks are cut into smaller pieces before they are vacuum packed.
Before leaving, I manage to purchase several bottles of shrimp paste. Marian tells me that although the retailers in downtown Tsim Sha Tsui sells the same product but it costs 40 per cent more than at Tai O.
I thank Marian profusely and bid the group farewell. I am off to the Tai O bus terminus to take bus No. 11 back to the Tung Chung MTR Station. The train will then take me back to my hotel in Kowloon. I am so glad the silver shrimp jumped in front of me earlier or else my day would not have been as amazing as it has turned out to be.