How many hipsters' childhood memories are maintained by straw kway teens?
Before I went to Taiwan, I always longed for such a thing as "burning immortal grass". After tasting it on the ground, I suddenly realized that the taste was a bit similar to our grass.
The immortal kway teow in Meizhou and other Hakka areas was very dismissive after eating it, and felt that there was no grass kway teow delicious.
Food is also dated. The generation born after the millennium probably ate more turtle balm than grass. People born before the 1970s and 1980s mostly prefer grassy rice. Turtle balm is the food that most closely resembles grass grits. But compared with the regularity of the turtle paste cut into small squares and the kind of petty bourgeoisie drizzled with honey juice, the shopkeepers use iron plates to pick up the cut grass, and finally sprinkle the layer of dense white sugar, but also because of its grass roots and casualness, in the hot summer, it makes people feel very happy.
The first process of making the kway teow is to wash the grass, boil the kway teow in water for a few hours and then rub it up, and the juice that drains out is the mother water.
The production of straw is actually very simple. Wash the grass and boil it for several hours, scoop up the grass and drain the juice while it is hot, add a very small amount of starch and boil for a while, pour it out and let it cool and condense.
Most people who sell grass kway teow are packed in a large clay bowl because this traditional container is more hydrophobic than modern stainless steel.
Add mother water to the starch and mix well.
The most famous grass kway teow in the chaozhou capital city in memory should be made by the old couple near the Hundred Flowers Terrace at the top of the street. When I was a child passing by my parents, most people would look at me and say, come on a bowl? He nodded, so he packed five or six copies and took them home to share with his brothers, sisters, and grandmas and others. In the previous summer, living in the old street of the ancient city, every summer afternoon, taking a nap, confused, I heard the shouting under the building - "grass - kueh - eh -", followed by a crisp knocking on the bowl, and in the afterglow, there was "grass koeh - " sound. Soon, it was the sound of the neighbor's uncle and aunt "grass to sell", mixed with the sound of kingkingkiangkiang colliding with the iron plate and the bowl. At this time, they would often be sent by the adults in the family to take a large bowl of gong, take a dime or two and walk out the door, and very proudly say to the grass seller Abo who pushed a broken bicycle with a box of straw and a bucket on his head - come to three bowls of grass. Staring at him neatly scooped the grass into the small bowl he had just knocked in, poured it into the big bowl, sprinkled it with sugar, and took it home to share with his family. Among neighbors, sometimes one party is busy and can't get out, and there are also people who help buy grass.
Abel, who was over seventy years old, recalled that he had been eating grass and rice since he was a child, and in the sixties and seventies it was a bowl of two cents and three cents, then it was five cents and a dime, and then later, it was five cents and one yuan, three yuan... "This kind of thing, the old slaves are good to eat, cool off the heat, and do not hurt the stomach." ”
In the summer, the grass kway teow is popular with the public, and the business of the kway teow stall is always worry-free.
Such grassroots food has also entered the pen of a great writer. Not long ago, teacher Guo Qihong posted a special article on "Grassroots Snacks" in the column of this newspaper's "Yan Yunju Essay", recalling the situation of herbivorous kunitol in his childhood:
"In summer, under the big banyan tree, there is a grass stall, a bowl with Huanggang characteristics of 'high branch lotus', containing black grass kway teow, of course, it will not be full, seven or eight. The seller sprinkles brown sugar, and you can't help but admire his skill, only a thin layer, but even and all-encompassing! Hungry as I slowly turn the bowl with my hands, my lips gently suck on the floating surface, the brown sugar is ten to eight or nine, and the grass is slightly reduced, this trick is also quite skillful, it is not a day's work! Then, my generation reached over the bowl and asked for sugar. It's an unwritten convention, and sellers usually add a second sugar. He did not violate the law and added some whiskers. I watched, very unsatisfied, and sucked again, hoping for the third time... The seller was not welcome: 'You slave! He ignored me, and I gave up. ”
The starch and mother water are mixed well and boiled for a while, and the clay bowl with good hydrophobic properties is poured in to cool and condense, and the grass is made.
This text, I believe, will make many of his teochew people of the same age smile.
After entering the 2000s, away from the old town, I rarely tasted the taste of grass. Once passing by the Hundred Flowers Terrace, I saw that the old couple was still there, so I bought several copies in one go and took them with my colleagues to taste. The surprise when colleagues saw them, and the satisfaction after eating, are still fresh in my memory. Nowadays, there are still many stalls selling grass in the ancient city area, but after trying several times, it seems that there is no taste of the year. Later, I heard that the old goose grass kway in the Baihuatai area was opened by the neighbors of Old Amu, which is also authentic, "more grassy". This summer, I bought it to taste, and the taste of the grass itself is still there, but it is also smooth and delicate, and the slight bitterness and fragrance of the faint grass are faint. But the small package of sugar added to it is not too soft, and it is not the thorough sand of traditional white sugar, which is ultimately inferior to the taste in memory. An old Aber who chatted in the shop laughed and said that the traditional grass kway teow is added with sugar, which is now mostly twisted by juicer.
After some hard work, the sanitation workers came to a bowl of grass grits, and they felt refreshed.
The same food, the same ingredients, the same method is also about the same, the difference is very subtle. But it is this heat, this cutting, and even whether the sugar is sprinkled evenly or not, that affects the feeling of the food, even this very grassroots grass.
And today, when summer food such as Wang Laoji ice cream is prevalent, we miss the grass grits, why not miss the long"grass grits that wake up the alley from the drowsy afternoon nap--", why not miss the childhood with the bright and dangling daylight.