zongzi

plural zongzis · alternative tsung-tze

1. A traditional Chinese dumpling of glutinous rice stuffed with a savoury or sweet filling, wrapped in large flat leaves, and cooked by steaming or boiling.

   Sunny ordered four zongzis or dumplings and, out of tradition, haggled with the woman until they agreed on a price.

   2011, Daniel Kalla, The Far Side of the Sky: A Novel of Love and Death in Shanghai, Toronto, Ont.: HarperCollins, →ISBN; paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Forge/A Tom Doherty Associates Book, 2015, →ISBN

   3 more examples

   The traditional fare around Dragon Boat Festival time is zongzi, pyramids of glutinous rice wrapped in reed leaves. The zongzi, it is said, symbolize the rice that the Miluo River people threw to the fish so that they would leave Qu Yuan's body undisturbed.

   1953, Department for International Work, All-China Democratic Women's Federation, editor, Women of China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, →OCLC, page 17, column 2

   The people honor the memory of Qu Yuan on this day by eating Zongzi and holding dragon-boat races. Zongzi are little packets of glutinous rice with jujubes, ham and sweet bean paste added for interest, wrapped in leaves of rushes.

   1979, China Reconstructs, Beijing: China Welfare Institute, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 49

   A week or two before the festival, villagers would prepare glutinous rice wrapped in bamboo leaves before cooking, commonly known as zongzi or chang (in Hokkien).

   2005, Lim Hin Fui, Fong Tian Yong, The New Villages in Malaysia: The Journey Ahead, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Institute of Strategic Analysis & Policy Research, →ISBN, page 126