Snow Fungus (Tremella) 银耳

The silver ear

Snow fungus — yin er, "silver ear" — is a frilled white mushroom that soaks from a crisp dried ruffle into something like an edible cloud. It has almost no taste of its own; what it brings is texture, a silken, faintly crunchy jelly, and a broth that turns glossy as the fungus releases its polysaccharides. Imperial kitchens prized it as the affordable twin of bird's nest soup, which is the polite way of saying the cooks fooled the court and everyone was happier for it.

What tradition says

The tradition files yin er under moistening: the autumn ingredient for a dry cough, a dry throat, dry skin — simmered sweet with rock sugar, red dates, lotus seed, and goji berries. It appears in the same breath as pear and honey in the seasonal kitchen: autumn's answer to autumn's dryness. Tradition's words, so labeled.

What research says

The modern interest is the polysaccharides, which hold water remarkably — hence tremella's new career in serums as "the natural hyaluronic acid." A 2023 dermatology review found genuine early evidence for skin hydration and wound-support effects, mostly from lab and small applied studies, and called for proper human trials before bigger promises^[1]. So: plausible moisturizer, pleasant food, unproven cure for anything. The tradition's "moistening" and the lab's "water-binding polymer" are having an interesting conversation; neither has finished it.

Xing Po's snow fungus soup

Soak one dried fungus thirty minutes; trim the yellow base; tear into petals. Simmer forty minutes with rock sugar, six red dates, and a spoon of lotus seeds until the broth turns silky. Goji berries in the last five minutes. Serve warm in autumn, chilled in summer. Xiao Hu drinks the broth and leaves the "clouds," which suits the doctor, who does the opposite — sixty years of marriage runs on such arrangements.

Buying and one caution

Choose pale-gold dried heads, not bleach-white ones. And soaked fungus is for the pot, not the pantry: cooked tremella dishes should be eaten fresh or refrigerated promptly, the same food-safety manners you would show any soaked mushroom.

Reviewed 2026-08-26