It is said that when Mr. Lu Xun stayed up late to write, the usual supper was a noodle cake. The surface of the long round strip cake is sprinkled with dots of sugar osmanthus flowers, wrapped in bean paste in the middle, and a gentle bite, the osmanthus flowers are overflowing with fragrance, and the mouth is full of excitement. There are many large and small dim sum shops on Tiantong Road that have a long history and good reputation.
Text/Xi Zhen Painting/Li Zhimi
Seasonal pastries and soy milk
The Shanghai cake dumplings are colorful and delicate
The most enjoyable food on Tiantong Road is the large and small dim sum shops scattered along the road, many of which have a long history and good reputation.
The most famous when Tui Tiantong Road Fujian North Road Intersection of Wancheng Xing Cake Dumpling Shop, this shop cake dumpling variety, exquisite materials, exquisite workmanship, known to white cake, red peach, green ball, yellow pine cake, black sesame cake and other five-color cake balls as the main body, bought and placed in the bamboo basket, the cake ball lined with a large piece of turquoise lotus leaves, it looks like lotus leaves lying on the flowers of colorful flowers, color and fragrance have been. Even ordinary pastries are made differently in his family, and the soft and sticky red bean cake in the mouth is wrapped in dark red red beans, and the bite is soft and fragrant.
The tender yellow double brew dough is translucent and seems to be blown to break, but the dumplings are hidden with two kinds of fillings, bean paste and black puff pastry, and they do not penetrate each other, and the two different delicacies intersect on the tip of the tongue, bringing strange taste enjoyment. The surface of the long round strip cake is sprinkled with dots of sugar osmanthus flowers, wrapped in bean paste in the middle, and a gentle bite, the osmanthus flowers are overflowing with fragrance, and the mouth is full of excitement. It is said that when Mr. Lu Xun stayed up late to write, the usual supper was a noodle cake.
There is also a cool and fluffy mint cake, half yellow-green on the top and white on the bottom, with bean paste filling in the middle, which is cool and refreshing. I prefer Dingsheng Cake, like its light red color, folded into pairs, soft and chewy to eat. Listen to my grandfather said that the Dingsheng cake was specially made by the people of Suzhou during the Southern Song Dynasty for Han Shizhong's Han family army to go out to encourage the soldiers, and the cake had the word "Dingsheng" on it, and later it was called Dingsheng Cake, which meant auspicious and auspicious.
Wan Chengxing will also introduce a variety of seasonal pastries at any time, such as before the Qingming Festival, which will launch a unique youth group. Wan Chengxing's green dough uses mugwort leaves, the color is dark green, with the unique fragrance of the mountains, slightly bitter, the glutinous rice ball is wrapped in sweet and delicate osmanthus bean paste, the bitter taste of the mugwort leaves is integrated so that the green dough is not too sweet, and the aftertaste is endless. Before the Qingming Festival, almost every household on Tiantong Road buys some, and even from far away.
Wanchengxing's seasonal pastries also include Dragon Boat Dumplings, Lixia Wine Brewing, Summer Cold Noodles, Mid-Autumn Moon Cake, September Respect for the Elderly Chongyang Cake, Winter Soup Dumplings, Spring Festival Rice Cakes, Spring Rolls, Lantern Festival, Eight Treasure Rice, etc., and the strong folk culture style ripples in the store all year round.
Li Zhimi painted
Opposite Wanchengxing, in the northwest corner of Tiantong Road North Fujian Road, there is a restaurant, the name is not remembered. This shop downstairs sells oil tofu vermicelli soup, rice and soy milk, upstairs is a tea house, upstairs tea customers in the tea at the same time, will order some snacks supplied downstairs, let the little guy to send up, this is also a kind of elegance.
Comparable to Wan Chengxing is the Ziyuan Zhai soybean milk store at No. 606 Tiantong Road near Henan North Road. This long-established soybean milk shop is said to have been founded by Huangyan native Dai Qianhai in 1882 and transferred to his children's generation in 1936.
Facing Tiantong Road, Ziyuanzhai is a single-bay façade, with a front shop and a workshop. His family's soybean milk is made of high-grade northeast soybeans, milled by hand, usually for one person to add materials and one person to grind, grinding soybean milk two guys from midnight to start operating, grinding a bucket of soy milk takes two or three hours, and then drain the okara, pour into a large iron pot and cook. After boiling, the thick soy milk should be evenly out, and the remaining soy milk should start to add water and then cook, and it is necessary to grasp the concentration at any time to add water or thick syrup. After the finished product, the soybean milk is steaming, the bean flavor is pure and pure, and the concentration of soy milk is maintained at more than 5 degrees. Ziyuan Zhai soybean milk is famous for its own characteristics in the city, good quality, many repeat customers, and unusually prosperous business.
There are two kinds of soy milk, sweet soy milk and salted soy milk, sweet soy milk only needs to add delicate cotton white sugar, steaming on the table, full of aroma, sweet and delicious. The production of salted soy milk is much more complicated, in order to ensure that the salted soy milk entrance has enough freshness, Ziyuan Zhai uses shrimp skin from Ningbo, Donghai, and soy sauce is pure brewed white soy sauce for more than half a year, with chopped fritters, squeezed vegetables, etc., and finally do not forget to pour a few drops of pingwang chili oil, and then sprinkle with green shallots. Brought to the table, but see the white soy milk spaced with coffee-colored chili oil, red shrimp skin, green oily green onions, guests have not eaten it is pleasing to the eye, and the bowl of beans, green onions, soy sauce fragrance with the bowl of heat drifting, but also tempting people's appetite, appetite. If so, the fame of this soybean milk shop has become bigger and bigger, and it has gradually become a famous store.
After the founding of new China, Ziyuanzhai expanded into a two-bay façade, considering that guests are difficult to eat soy milk, but also have to be accompanied by dry snacks, Ziyuanzhai took the opportunity to make a flatbread.
The flatbread is divided into sweet and salty flatbread, the sweet flatbread is wrapped in white sugar, while it is hot, the syrup inside will sneak out, and the cake is sprinkled with sesame seeds, which is fragrant and sweet to eat. Their salty flatbread is also very elaborate, first brushing the dough with a layer of oil to make it crispy, and then sprinkling with green onions, which is fragrant. They also produce fritters, which are to be eaten while they are hot, and there is often a long queue in front of the fritter stove at the entrance of The Yuanyuan Zhai, and the freshly fried fritters are fragrant and crispy, and it is a perfect match to be wrapped in a large cake. Rice wrapped in fritters is also a feature of Ziyuan Zhai, put a spoonful of white sugar in the rice, fritters, sugar sweet, rice sticky, salty or sweet soy milk, serving the world's delicacies, no wonder the store is crowded with diners all day.
In addition to the popularity of soy milk snacks, his family also has treasures that other people's families do not have, which makes it difficult for this small soy milk shop to be famous. Because there is a soybean milk Xishi in this store, she is the daughter of the shop owner, the head and shoulder of the Fanghuayue Opera Troupe, Dai Zhonggui. In the 1950s and 1960s, when Yue opera was popular in Shanghai Beach, Yue opera actors at that time were as popular as today's singers, and we schoolgirls were all Fans of Yue Opera at that time. Dai Zhonggui played with Yin Guifang, who was known as the emperor of Yue opera, and was a popular Yue opera Hua Dan. In particular, she played the chivalrous palace maid Kou Chengyu in Fanghua's famous drama "Chen Lin and Kou Chengyu" (also known as "Tanuki Cat for Prince"), and her singing and composition were excellent, and she became famous for a while.
Many Yue opera fans who do not live on Tiantong Road have come to Ziyuanzhai on Tiantong Road after watching this play co-starring Yin Guifang and Dai Zhonggui, in order to see the offstage style of this famous Yue opera actor. Even if you don't have the opportunity to see Fang Rong, sitting down to drink a bowl of soy milk Xi Shijia's soy milk is also a kind of psychological satisfaction, and the fame of Tiantong Road Ziyuan Zhai has become louder and louder.
About the author and the painter
Cherish
Xi Zhen, real name Zhu Xi Zhen. Shanghai writer.
He is the author of "Sea Scholar - A Life of Smoke and Rain", "The Style That Never Drifts Away", "Afternoon Tea in the Garden House", "Farewell love in the depths of the sycamore", "Approaching Grassroots Artists", "Looking for Shanghai in Shanghai" and other urban cultural theme monographs. The 2016 edition of Shanghai Road That Never Widens (all three volumes) has been reprinted many times so far, and its e-book has been introduced by the Stanford University Library and emory University Library in the United States.
In 2018, he co-authored and published the novel "House Facing the Mediterranean Sea" with a friend.
In 2020, he was named one of the top ten public cultural tourism figures in Jing'an District.
In 2021, he published the essay collection "Shanghai: Spiritual Walking" (upper and lower volumes), which writes about the past and present lives of the city from the perspective of a writer, and depicts a vivid picture of the city with words.
Li Zhimi
Graduated from China Academy of Art, contemporary ink artist. He currently lives in Shanghai.
He has published illustrated picture books such as "Hour", "Mr. Zhimi's Heart Painting", "Chang Xiang Zhi", "Jun from His Hometown", "All Things and Me", "Zhou Zuo Humanities Collection", "Zhu Guangqian Book Series", "Shanghai Snack Guide", "Mountains, Breeze and Bright Moon", "Happiness is a Family To Spend Three Meals and Four Seasons", "Love - Grandma and Me", "Walking and Walking", "Beautiful Poetry Classic" (co-authored) and other illustrated picture books.
Days Li Zhimi
Editor's Note:
This column originates from paragon, a supplement to Jing'an Bao, which was launched on February 8, 1994. On the WeChat platform, "Paramount" will be displayed to readers in a new form. Push it regularly every week, read Jing'an from another angle. Submissions can be sent to [email protected]
Source: Shanghai Jing'an