Jianbing (Chinese crepes)

“Jianbing” (or “jian bing”) is a breakfast food sometimes called a Chinese crepe. It has eggs and flour, and the crepe (or pancake) is topped with scallions, coriander, baocui (a crispy cracker), chili paste and sesame seeds, among other items (as desired). It’s folded and then usually wrapped in paper and eaten by hand.
 
Although jianbing has been known in northeast China for almost 2,000 years, the dish is new to English speakers. “Jianbings, a rolled-up combination of pancakes and eggs that passes for fast food here (Beijing—ed.)” was printed in the St. Petersburg (FL) Times on May 26, 1989. “A Beijing fast-food breakfast is a kind of crepe called a jian bing guo zi prepared at a mobile street stall. The cook spreads a circle of batter on a griddle, cracks and stirs an egg over the bubbling pancake, adds a strip of fried bread, brushes on some chili sauce, folds the whole thing up and wraps it in paper” was printed in The Province (Vancouver, BC) on October 8, 1989.
 
“Manhattan Savors a Chinese Incursion: Street-Food Crepes” by Michael Forsythe was printed in the New York (NY) Times on April 21, 2016:
   
“Now, they are sweeping across Manhattan, with sightings near Washington Square Park, Midtown and Columbia University. Resistance is futile. Jianbing, a street-food crepe from northern China made with eggs, chili and sweet sauce, cilantro, scallions and a crunchy deep-fried dough wafer, is Beijing’s latest culinary flexing of soft power.”
 
     
Wikipedia: Jianbing
Jianbing (simplified Chinese: 煎饼; traditional Chinese: 煎餅; pinyin: jiānbǐng; literally: “fried pancake”) is a traditional Chinese street food similar to crepes. It is a type of bing generally eaten for breakfast and hailed as “one of China’s most popular street breakfasts.” The main ingredients of jianbing are a batter of wheat and grain flour, eggs and sauces. It can be topped with different fillings and sauces such as baocui (薄脆, thin and crispy fried cracker), ham, chopped or diced mustard pickles, scallions and coriander, chili sauce or hoisin sauce depending on personal preference. It is often folded several times before serving.
 
Jianbing is now spreading to the West in cities such as New York City, Seattle, Chicago and San Francisco, sometimes with modifications for Western tastes.
         
26 May 1989, St. Petersburg (FL) Times, “China break-dances away from the past” by Jack R. Payton, pg. 4A, col. 1:
Then there was a bit of discussion among themselves as the students passed around some jianbings, a rolled-up combination of pancakes and eggs that passes for fast food here.
(...)
“What we want,” he said between bites of jianbing, “is a situation in which we know what the government is doing, we know how the decisions are made, and we want to be consulted on those decisions.”
 
8 October 1989, The Province (Vancouver, BC), “Life goes on under the guns: Beijing Series: From China” by Lorner Mallin, pg. 36, col. 4:
A Beijing fast-food breakfast is a kind of crepe called a jian bing guo zi prepared at a mobile street stall. The cook spreads a circle of batter on a griddle, cracks and stirs an egg over the bubbling pancake, adds a strip of fried bread, brushes on some chili sauce, folds the whole thing up and wraps it in paper.
 
It’s only 25 cents, less if you bring your own egg. And it tastes great.
   
31 October 1991, The Christian Science Monitor (Boston, MA), “Breakfast in Beijing: How the Real Chinese Eat; Instead of restaurant-style fare, most have a cuisine rich in grains, vegetables, and folklore” by Ann Scott Tyson, pg. 14, col. 2:
Another popular snack is jian bing, a paper-thin egg pancake seasoned with green onion and fresh coriander and wrapped around a fried wheat roll.
     
,a href=‘https://books.google.com/books?id=YuabRChi9EEC&pg=PA107&dq=%22jianbings%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwju8vqpnPjfAhWDZd8KHeLPCawQ6AEIKzAA#v=onepage&q=%22jianbings%22&f=false”>Google Books
The Diary of a Curious Man
By Patrick Black
Drogheda, Ireland: Leo de Freyne
2006
Pg. 107:
23 November 1996. After our customary Saturday morning jianbings (a kind of omelette bought on the street, delicious), we visited the site of the Imperial College.
 
21 January 2007, New York (NY) Times, “Frugal Traveler-Shanghai: Balancing the Past, the Future and a Budget” by Matt Gross, Travel sec., pg. 9, col. 1:
... and grabbed a quick snack of jian bing, a crepe stuffed with egg, chili sauce and a piece of fried dough, from a street vendor (1 yuan).
       
The World of Chinese
Jianbing: A guide to China’s favorite street food
It’s not quite a crepe and it’s not quite a burrito—what is this snack everyone’s talking about?
03·28·2012 Juling He (何菊玲)
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Jianbings originated in China’s northeast, where grains and cereals are common, though they can extend down to northern Jiangsu (you won’t, however, find them most places out west). The most common version of jianbing sold in Beijing hail from Shandong Province, and are made from the aforementioned batter of wheat and coarse grains (beans, cereals, etc.). Similar are the jianbings sourced from Hebei Province and northeast China, nearby Shandong. The other main family of bing hails from the nearby city of Tianjin, where it is sometimes called a jianbing guozi (煎饼果子, with guozi referring to the youtiao stuffing). Tianjing jianbings are traditionally made from green mung bean flour, a gluten-free ingredient used to make the transparent “glass noodles.”
 
Serious Eats (August 2015)
Why Jianbing is China’s Most Popular Street Breakfast
FIONA REILLY
Jianbing is one of China’s most popular street breakfasts. And while all manner of Chinese buns and dumplings have spread well beyond the country’s borders, it also might be China’s best-kept culinary secret. The savory crisp-fried crêpes are all about bold contrasts of flavor and texture: eggs, spread over the surface of the wheat and mung bean flour pancake as it cooks. Crunchy puffed strips of fried wonton. A jumble of grassy cilantro, peppery scallions, and tangy pickles; a sweet and spicy layer of hoisin and chili sauces. And each one is cooked fresh to order on a circular cast-iron grill, just the way you want it.
(...)
Jianbing have a longer history than almost any other Chinese street food. Thought to have originated in Shandong Province during the Three Kingdoms Period (220–280 AD), military strategist Zhuge Liang had his soldiers cook batter on shields held over the fire after their woks were lost.
 
YouTube
Chinese Breakfast Crepes Land in NYC
Consumer Eyes
Published on Mar 30, 2016
Proper Jian Bing - a savory crepe with a devoted following in China - are notoriously hard to find stateside. We stopped by the Mr. Bing pop-up in downtown NYC to see what goes into making these street-food treats, and we walked away hooked.
         
21 April 2016, New York (NY) Times, “Manhattan Savors a Chinese Incursion: Street-Food Crepes” by Michael Forsythe, pg. A12:
Fresh from China, they came ashore in the San Francisco Bay Area. They stormed Seattle. They descended on Portland, Ore.
 
Now, they are sweeping across Manhattan, with sightings near Washington Square Park, Midtown and Columbia University.
 
Resistance is futile.
 
Jianbing, a street-food crepe from northern China made with eggs, chili and sweet sauce, cilantro, scallions and a crunchy deep-fried dough wafer, is Beijing’s latest culinary flexing of soft power.
 
Eater
Building Beijing’s Favorite Street Food with NYC’s Mr. Bing
A jianbing is a savory, stuffed crepe
by Eater Video Sep 21, 2016, 1:30pm EDT
A New York City pop-up serving a traditional Beijing street food, Mr. Bing has been a ubiquitous presence at the city’s food markets and festivals since it launched in 2015. The stand serves jianbing, scallion- and sesame seed-studded crepes stuffed with eggs and other fillings that are artfully composed on a flat-top grill. Watch the video above for a look into the dish’s assembly process.
 
YouTube
Popular Chinese street food, Jianbing, hits NYC
CGTN America
Published on Feb 8, 2017
New Yorkers are getting their first taste of the popular Chinese street food Jianbing, thanks to the opening of new stands and food trucks in the city. CGTN’s Lorna Shaddick reports.
 
YouTube
Jianbing - How to Make Authentic, Street Food style Jianbing Guozi at Home (煎饼果子)
Chinese Cooking Demystified
Published on Oct 9, 2017
Jianbing Guozi, probably one of the top five most popular Chinese street foods.  We’ll need some equipment and adjustments to make this on a home stove, but the end result is that same real taste that you’d get from a street vendor.
 
Most Jianbing also have that crunchy guobie cracker in the middle, which we’ll also teach you how to cook.  The original Tianjin style is also very similar (but uses pure mungbeans), which we’ll talk about in the reddit post.  This style is the street foot style that you’d get in Beijing, Shanghai, or wherever.