Have you ever gatecrashed a wedding uninvited just for the food? Well, anything you can do, the Chinese can do better. Foodies in that country have discovered an unexpected hot spot for a delicious meal: a funeral home.
Yes, you read that right. A noodle dish served at Erlong Funeral Home's canteen has become so viral on social media that it’s drawing crowds like a celebrity chef's pop-up restaurant — except, you know, with mourners.
The Erlong Funeral Home is located in Guizhou, a province famous for its spicy and sour cuisine. According to a BBC report, the canteen, which originally catered to those dealing with funeral matters, started serving noodle dishes that quickly became a sensation. As word spread, more and more people — some even pretending to be relatives of the deceased — started showing up just for the noodles.
In an effort to manage this noodle frenzy, Erlong has announced they’ll allow a limited number of outsiders to enjoy the famous noodles — as long as they don’t disturb the mourners.
The canteen serves various types of noodles for breakfast and supper, with a bowl costing just 10 yuan ($1.38). The most popular option is noodles topped with minced pork and peanuts.
One Erlong worker told Jiupai News that the canteen had initially only served those with funeral business to attend to. However, as word spread, people began sneaking in for a bowl of noodles. Sometimes the line is so long that customers have to wait for hours.
"There are people pretending to be family members of the deceased," the worker told the BBC. "It gets crowded, and sometimes it's hard to tell who's there to mourn and who's there for noodles."
To meet the growing demand, the funeral home now offers 50 free bowls of noodles each day to the public — under the condition that they don’t interfere with mourners, according to the chef’s comments in a local media interview.
This noodle craze began earlier this month when a social media user posted about their visit to the Erlong Funeral Home. They wrote on Xiaohongshu (RedNote), "The food at this funeral home is amazing. The food line is longer than the line to lay flowers for the deceased."
“I didn’t get to try the noodles because my friend’s mom didn’t know anyone holding a funeral service,” they said.
Since then, plenty of other social media users have jumped on the bandwagon to share their noodle adventures.
On Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, one user posted a picture of the crowded dining hall, joking, "I heard the noodles here were incredible. Life’s short, so I had to grab another bowl."
