Just after the Eighth Year, the atmosphere of the New Year is getting thicker, when waiting for the train at the station after work, the whole street is hung up with a big red lantern, under the bright light reflection, more dazzling, the city of life has banned the whip as early as ten years ago, the crackling sound of firecrackers in the ears is less, always feel that something is missing, although the deafening sound of firecrackers in the thirty nights is slightly noisy, but for many years do not hear this sound, and it is inevitable to be lonely, since the firecrackers do not let go, hanging lanterns is still OK, both festive, and there is no little pollution, This big red lantern hangs up, and the taste of the New Year is faintly coming.
Speaking of the New Year, the happiest is the child, crazy play for more than a month, not to mention, just that tempting variety of food, how not to look forward to it? This can't help but remind me of the Spring Festival of childhood, when everyone's days were quite tight, as early as a few months before the New Year, my mother was in the New Year's Eve, the accumulation of meat tickets is certainly indispensable, even if the days are tight, you have to fry a few pounds of rounds, more generous to fry a few pounds, not so generous to fry a few pounds less, where does the meat of this fried ball come from? In that era of supply by ticket, buying anything was not as simple as handing over money, you had to have a sufficient amount of tickets, to buy rice to buy food stamps, to buy oil tickets, to buy cloth tickets, as for this to buy meat, of course, you want meat tickets. A big family has several mouths, no matter how to fry more than ten pounds of rounds, but also to prepare some for entertaining guests, so the mother began to accumulate meat tickets, although the weekday dishes are less meaty, but when you think of the golden meat balls, there is nothing to complain about.
At that time, every household burned honeycomb coal, where there is a separate kitchen, build a hut at the door, the stove to the middle of the swing is even if it is a kitchen, who makes what dishes, the old far away will smell the aroma of vegetables, from the front of the house, do not have to look as long as you smell the aroma of fried dumplings, you know which family began to prepare for the New Year's food. Inside and outside the home all rely on the mother to take care of it, at that time there was no convenient equipment for the meat grinder, all relying on the mother's hands on the cutting board to chop the meat filling, sometimes itchy, also once went up to try a few, a few rounds can not do, the arm sore can not lift up, all said cherry delicious tree difficult to plant, this meat ball delicious meat stuffing is difficult to chop is real.
After all, people have little strength, chopping meat stuffing is not OK, then help roll the noodles to do dumplings, first reconcile the noodles, and then use the rolling pin to roll out into a thin round dough cake, and then use a knife to cut into two fingers wide and a finger long, the middle of a thin slit, the end from the gap flipped over, a dumpling is done, the family I am the youngest, my brother and sister are only a few years older than me, are half-grown children, look at the mother can roll the noodles thin and even, but in our hands, it is rolled thick as a palm, so thick noodles made into dumplings, so thick noodles made into dumplings, In the frying pan to fry for half a day to be able to fry, a bite down, is very gritty teeth, anyway, eat at home, do not care about what taste and look, turn dumplings all year round and only in the New Year can eat once, has not had time to savor, a full bucket of dumplings has seen the bottom. When our sisters and brothers were frying dumplings, the son of Uncle Yuan next door smelled the fragrance and came over, four or five-year-old children, where to manage those, see delicious, always hungry, a moment to run over, take a few pieces of dumplings, eat full of mouth oil, that humble appearance, but also added some fun.
Such a big job as fried dumplings is still handled by the mother herself, the heat has not arrived, the rounds are not cooked inside, the heat has passed, the outer skin of the rounds is charred, the first basket of rounds that have just come out of the pot is full of aroma, the golden flesh skin is bubbling with hot oil, and it does not care whether it is hot, and it is sent to the mouth, the tenderness of the pork, wrapped in ginger, green onions, condiments mixed with the unique fresh fragrance, so that the taste buds are fully relaxed, in that era of life embarrassment, this should be the best delicious that can be eaten at that time!
It was late at night, the rounds in the basket were piled up into a bulging hill, the large barrel and small basin were also occupied by the twisted waist dumplings, a pot of boiled hot oil was still tumbling, without the slightest intention of stopping, just this pot of hot oil, and fried a large basin of peanuts and rice, still unfinished, boiling this pot of hot oil cost a lot of coal, so it was cold, it was a pity, so I turned out a few large apples from the cardboard box, washed and cut into small cubes, and went down to the pot, even the hemp baking cake that was rare to eat once a year was also opened, and the oil pan was laid down piece by piece. The fiery red fire reflects the joyful face, the outside of the house is quiet and cold, but the inside of the house is steaming, the aroma is full of old cottages, looking forward to it for so long, the beauty of the New Year is nothing more than this.
Chinese New Year's Eve rice is definitely the highlight, bacon stir-fried vegetables, braised carp, green pepper fried beef, these dishes are the same a lot, and then a large bowl of vermicelli meat ball soup, pork rib soup on the stove lest be snubbed, desperately screaming, so many delicious dishes, eyes are looking at the flowers, good dishes have, how can there be no good wine, "Zhuangyuanhong" has long been bought, now think back, then the "Zhuangyuanhong" is just a bottle of crude fruit wine, the wine is mixed with the sweetness of soda, and with a little alcohol astringency and momentum, In fact, the taste is very general, but even so, it is still "love to let go", a year to the end, can only be drunk once at thirty nights of New Year's dinner, how can not taste for a long time!
The Yuanyuan red sweet wine that was drunk at that time was an ordinary glass bottle with a label paper attached to it, and now it cannot be seen.
At that time, the city center did not have a ban on whips, the acute child was still more than ten minutes away from the bell to light the firecrackers, we would not be so anxious, about three or five minutes away from the bell to start preparing, two thousand firecrackers were all spread out to have enough spacious open space, if the ground was wet, the firecrackers were half burned and it was easy to be dudded, and then simply found a long wooden stick, picked the firecracker on the wooden stick, never beat from the beginning to the end, as for the firecrackers that fell on the ground and did not burn, they were picked up one by one by us. Find a small branch to lead in the stove, one by one slowly play.
A few decades have passed, the taste of the New Year has become more and more faded, with the ticket supply has long become history, the current stamp album still retains a few yellowed food stamps, the extremely precious food stamps of the year, today in addition to talking about the pleasure of collecting, it is useless, as for the meatballs that do not forget, dumplings, the next floor to walk dozens of steps to the vegetable market can be bought at any time, the quality is good, the taste is good, compared to our pure handicraft of the year, it has been upgraded to a grade, especially the dumplings, sweet and crisp, thin as cicada wings, I don't know how to make it so thin and crisp, but I just looked at it from a distance, and I didn't have the slightest desire to eat. Not long ago, on the road of the community happened to meet Xiao Chang, many years have not seen, the four or five-year-old little fat dun has now passed the age of standing, Xiao Chang is driving a car, his wife and daughter are sitting next to it, three or four years old Xiao Loli is holding a box of exquisite snacks in her hand, it is all foreign languages, one does not know, a stunned work, Xiao Chang's car has gone far.