The sesame bing is the food Changzhou is most proud of and the one thing you should make a point of eating before leaving. It is a flaky round pastry, roughly the size of a thick pancake, made from layered wheat dough and coated in sesame seeds before being baked flat against the inner wall of a charcoal-heated cylindrical oven. The result is simultaneously crispy on the outside and soft within, with a faint smokiness. Fillings range from sweet red bean paste to minced pork with spring onion to plain — the savoury version is the more interesting.
Vendors selling sesame bing operate from small carts and permanent stalls throughout the old city, and the baking is done in full view. A single bing costs a few yuan; eating two or three at a stall on a cold morning is as good as Changzhou gets at street-food level. The streets around the old canal quarter and near Tianning Temple have the highest concentration of reliable vendors.