Empress Dowager Cixi's ordinary day's life, if according to today's level, probably how much money is enough
Empress Dowager Cixi did not comment on her merits, but only said that Cixi's eating and wearing degree, the normal expenses of this day, are really amazing.
During the Cixi period, Princess Deling, the daughter of the Qing Dynasty ambassador to France, was left by Cixi as a female official after returning to China, and had the privilege of witnessing the life and life of Empress Dowager Cixi, and after leaving the palace, she compiled a large number of details of Cixi's life into "My Two Years with Cixi".
Cixi loves food
When you read several accounts of Empress Dowager Cixi, you will find that Cixi is particularly fond of food, and it occupies a large proportion of her day's life.
When Deling had just returned to China, he had the opportunity to have lunch with Cixi, and in this lunch, Deling was an eye-opener, because Cixi's lunch was particularly hearty.
Just by virtue of Deling's memory, this lunch meal contains at least pork, lamb, various exotic fruits and vegetables, wild game from the mountains, and poultry such as chickens, ducks, geese and so on.
Not only that, but there are more than ten different cooking methods for pork alone, including pork balls, meat cutting, etc., and the craftsmanship takes into account the forms of frying and frying.
Similarly, lamb naturally has countless dishes, including lamb chops, mutton soup, etc., and naturally brings together a lot of different styles of cooking, which is dizzying and has a great appetite.
Careful friends will find that at cixi's sumptuous table, there is no beef dish.
That's because cultivating cattle, as an important productive force of human farming civilization, has always accompanied human development and progress, and in ancient society, cultivating cattle from rare to precious, after thousands of years of changes, but still did not change the idea of "eating cultivating cattle is ominous", for this view, Cixi is deeply convinced.
In Cixi's lunch, although chickens, ducks and geese are ordinary poultry, they have unique craftsmanship and exquisiteness, whether it is roast chicken on the table, bone-breaking chicken, or roast duck, all of which are added to the pine branches to enhance the taste.
Under the blend of meat and rosin, this ordinary poultry has also become extraordinary, not to mention that the chicken and duck used by the Cixi Emperor are different from the folk chickens and ducks, and they have a special means of cultivation.
Remember that there was a corrupt official in the Qing Dynasty, who used ginseng crushing as feed to breed livestock, that is, the best quality poultry, I am afraid that the degree of cherishing is not much more than the peacock, Cixi's ingredients will naturally not fall behind.
Coupled with a variety of brine and sausages, Cixi's lunch is comparable to a "delicacy on the tip of the tongue of the Qing Dynasty", especially the staple food used by Cixi, which is mostly noodles.
Grilled, steamed, fried, fried, appetizing, pasta also becomes sparkling, not only full of color and flavor, but also every food can be called a carving-level work of art, dragons, phoenixes, butterflies, flowers abound, breathtaking.
In fact, when Deling first attended Cixi's lunch, what he saw was only the tip of the iceberg.
Cixi's emphasis on food is unimaginable to many people, and she has set up a Western dining room for herself to enjoy food, and specially prepares various special foods for herself.
The Western Dining Room was crowded all day long, because Cixi needed at least a thousand dishes a day, and they all had to be top-quality.
Dishes, staple foods are already amazing, in fact, her royal dim sum is not to mention more, in Cixi's menu, the number of dim sum is also as high as 400, and each one will inevitably have a unique shape and taste, after all, this kind of dim sum is a kind of enjoyment type snack, if the quality is lost to the shape of the staple food, is not it self-inducing thunder?
Seeing this, there will certainly be people who doubt, such a number of meals, Cixi Yijie female stream can enjoy it, and whether the remaining dishes will continue to be eaten tomorrow?
Including staple foods and snacks, more than a thousand kinds of dishes a day, Cixi will definitely not be able to enjoy them, but it will not be left for tomorrow to enjoy, if there is no reward, these delicacies will be destroyed, if there is a reward, these delicacies can enter the mouth of some eunuchs and palace women.
Cixi also had a rule that only one bite of each dish was eaten, and if the slave who served made a mistake, he would be driven out of the palace.
When Cixi took the second bite of a dish, there was only one situation, and after the old man took the first bite, she said: "This dish is good." The waiter will give Cixi a second bite, but no matter how delicious the dish is, Cixi must not eat the third bite, if so, there will be a eunuch to remind a "withdraw", and the third bite will not be eaten.
In addition, the nuts and other things that Cixi usually likes to eat when watching plays are all ordinary products, and even use fruits as incense and place them next to her so that she can smell the fruit at any time, and this fruit must be updated many times a day to keep it fresh.
16,258 pounds of grapes, 16,625 pounds of hawthorn, 589 pounds of sand fruits, 1526 pounds of plums, 985 pounds of sour peaches, 510 pomegranates, 2425 civilian fruits, 2236 persimmons, 52,855 tang pears, 125,898 autumn pears, apples 78526, oranges are the most terrifying, more than 150,000, in addition to countless walnuts, chestnuts, dates, black dates, white fruits, hazelnuts, sunsabi, English and Russian petals and so on.
Cixi's pomp and circumstance
Cixi is not only pompous in terms of food, but also in any other way, she must be the best in the world, even if it is only the toilet.
Cixi is the most exquisite toilet, first bathing and changing clothes, and then ordering the palace maid to prepare the toilet, and the toilet water should be full of rose petals, which can not only remove the taste, but also prevent the splash of water.
After finishing, the palace ladies on both sides of the column stepped forward one by one and sprayed a mouthful of water on the paper towel, which could soften the paper towel and make the water not cold or hot, just the body temperature.
This seems to be a big but not luxurious thing, but in fact, the hidden value behind it is extremely high.
The imperial palace of the Qing Dynasty did not have a water source, although there were countless wells, but it could not be used as the living water of Cixi, and the water in the palace came from the back mountain and needed to be transported by water wheels, which was naturally extremely precious.
Therefore, behind Cixi's one-time toilet, what is hidden is actually a lot of manpower and material resources, this hidden luxury, not to mention that money can be easily obtained.
Even when Cixi was sleeping, there was actually a large amount of money burning, because there were 8 palace women serving day and night in her bedchamber, and 6 guards outside the palace to protect her personal safety.
8 senior caregivers, plus 6 super bodyguards of such a high level, if it is two shifts, the cost will be doubled.
According to the salary of ordinary senior nurses on January 3w, 16 people also need 16,000 yuan a day, and the salary of each super bodyguard is 3,000 yuan a day, and 12 people are 36,000 yuan a day, and this alone costs 52,000 yuan.
Coupled with the chefs, craft stylists, dim sum chefs and so on in cixi western dining room, according to the annual salary of a restaurant chef of 1.2 million yuan, it is also 3,000 yuan a day.
Cixi has more than a thousand dishes a day, the number of chefs and chefs is bound to be quite large, coupled with other expenses such as changing knives, I am afraid that there will be more than 100,000 in a day.
The cost of Cixi's daily life
Cixi's foreign tribute rouge used in the morning grooming, the royal makeup artist, is calculated according to 1000 per day;
The daily wear of the clothing designer, even the daily maintenance of his noble clothing, the maintenance of the face and hair and other body, and the intake of health care products, according to the daily calculation of 5000;
Daily fruit, nut eating standards, if it is calculated according to the price of tribute, naturally much higher than the market price, if calculated according to the record, this daily consumption is a sky-high price, let alone only 10,000 yuan;
The daily salary cost of personnel is only the salary of important personnel, the salary of catering personnel is 100,000, and the daily salary of taking care of living and security is 50,000, which adds up to about 150,000;
Empress Dowager Cixi's 1,000 imperial meals and 400 dim sum, especially the large bowl of shark fin fort in the middle of the table, considering that its ingredient selection must be good, but it is still conservatively estimated at 150,000 bar.
In this way, in the case that Cixi does not make clothes, does not gesture, does not tip anyone, etc., there is no additional fee, just a normal day of living, the cost is about 366,000.