Baixiang City God Temple, walking around the Nine-Curved Bridge, seeing the lotus pond, eating small snacks - the worldly pleasures of the Taiping New Year are always so tempting.
(In the past, the food stalls on the square in front of the City God Temple temple can taste many local flavors)
Walking through the streets and alleys of the City God Temple, no one will be indifferent to the variety of flavor snacks, not to mention the chinese time-honored shops are full of signs, most of the tourists who are rubbing shoulders are holding food in their hands, giggling and laughing, and they are completely concerned about eating, and the breeze is wrapped in wisps of incense in the laneway, making people involuntarily speed up their pace to find the source of the soul-snatching smell.
I have always regarded the City God Temple as the spiritual hometown of Shanghainese citizens, and its fireworks are the breath of Shanghainese people.
The food stalls of the City God Temple have slowly developed into a city through the prosperity of the temple fair.
(Sugar porridge of the City God Temple, red and white pairs)
According to the memories of old Shanghai, in the 1920s and 1930s, the food stalls of the City God Temple were scattered in a circle centered on the Huxin Pavilion, and there were no less than 100 at its peak.
They are all small businesses, mostly for the scale of husband and wife shops, molds or shoulders, shouting along the way, or setting up stalls on the side of the road, gathering in the downtown, or entering the tea house liquor store for sale, see sewing needles.
The product is on the road, the hospitality is sincere, the business is slowly getting bigger, and finally borrowed the feng shui treasure land of the City God Temple to develop into a wangpu. Nanxiang Mantou Shop, Ningbo Tangtuan Shop, Osmanthus Hall, Hubin Food Building, Chunfeng Songyue Building, etc., are all old brands that have been baptized by wind and rain for a hundred years.
On the east side of the main entrance of the City God Temple, there is an old Tong Chun, which is also a long-established brand that is entrenched in the memory of old Shanghai, which is run by a Wuxi man named Yang Tong Chun, who makes a living with Su Xi gang dim sum such as gluten and leaves, vegetable meat wontons and so on.
When I was a child, my father took me to eat soup dumplings at the Wuxi Hotel of the City God Temple, which has eight extremely stylish floor-to-ceiling vermilion lacquer carved lattice gates, the threshold is a foot high, whether it evolved from the old Tong Chun, it is waiting for the old predecessors to teach me.
(Snacks are the breath of a city)
It is said that in the past, there were more than a dozen stalls selling gluten and blind leaves in the City God Temple, in addition to the old Tong Chun, there was also a restaurant called "Lan Zhai" - this name is so elegant, and it has raced a note fan village. The shop opened behind a small world, and on the stove sat a compartmentalized copper pot, the raw materials were raw and cooked separately, and an old lady took the spoon. The old lady wore a plain dress, light gray or taupe white, tightly coiled in a bun, and if in the summer, there would be a pair of white orchids on the slanted placket of the cardigan.
Old Shanghai called two louvers with two glutens "double gear", and one louver with one gluten was called single gear, also called "Mandarin Duck". Lan Zhai's soup is made of kaiyang and flat tip hanging for four or five hours, and the leaves and gluten are also homemade, and the filling is solid and the taste is authentic. In the old days, small businessmen, although they made you a small profit, they were not sloppy at all.
(Wontons are a portrayal of Shanghai's urban spirit)
According to a teacher, the reason why the gluten blinds of the City God Temple are delicious is because a little bit of noodle alkali is added to the soup, and the blinds are softer and stickier, the taste is better, and the color is white. And gluten is also specially made, unlike the gluten stuffed meat that is usually eaten at home, chopsticks poke a hole and then stuff it into the minced meat, but with wet gluten wrapped in meat filling under the frying pan fried to swollen hair, do not show the mouth, the meat brine will not be lost, the taste is of course better.
(Gluten louver, also known as Mandarin duck)
I remember entering from the main entrance of the City God Temple before, I can see that there is a Yuxin dim sum shop on the right side of the main hall, don't look at its shop is not amazing, and pick out a large piece of unsightly rain poncho, but it is a place where old food often punches in. Yuxin's varieties include tofu flowers, chicken and duck blood soup, sake stuffed dumplings, vegetable meat ravioli, etc., and what I will never forget is osmanthus white sugar lotus heart porridge.
When it comes to sugar porridge, Shanghainese can't help but smile. The market voice of "Tuk Tuk Tuk, Sell Sugar Porridge" has evolved into a beautiful song, evoking people's infinite nostalgia for the past.
The sugar porridge of the City God Temple was first picked up by a vendor named Zhang Zhifei, who first cooked it at home and put it in a red-lacquered wooden barrel and sold it in front of the temple. Sugar porridge is the minimum of snacks, but there is also a famous scripture, there is a kind of "red and white inlay", which is made of osmanthus sugar porridge and red bean sugar porridge, which is particularly cute in the bowl.
And the sugar porridge of Yuxin Dim Sum Shop added red dates and lotus hearts, which is another kind of red and white pairing, which is not the same as the same song.
Now there is no Yuxin dim sum shop, but the sign of the old Tong Chun is hung up again, and on the south side of the Jiuqu Bridge, borrowed the shop of Songyun Lou to do business.
I had eaten his family's vegetable meat ravioli, and the solid filling was filled with lard residue, and when I took a bite, the aroma was fragrant. The skin is full of strength, and you can eat the original aroma of wheat. The homely flavor of the lanes has soothed the nostalgia of Shanghainese.
So can the old Tong Chun restore the flavor snack of sugar porridge, I am looking forward to it!
(The sign of the old Tong Tsubaki is hanging out again)
Compared with the old city of various people and other bee tun ants gathering, Shanghai's Cantonese people are more concentrated, Hongkou is their base camp, they are more particular about eating, so the meals, so the tea, the usual grinding teeth and chewing mouth is also so. For example, the moon cake, which was originally a seasonal pastry, ate one of him when looking up at the bright moon, and the Mid-Autumn Festival was over.
(Cantonese Chicken Cake)
However, Guangdong nationals pay attention to the brand, Xinghualou, Xinya, LiNanju, Guanshengyuan and other old brands are the first choice, and there are Cantonese, Su-style and Chao-style divisions in varieties. Local Shanghai residents prefer freshly baked fresh meat mooncakes, and the enthusiasm in the queue is quite amazing.
The Li Nan Ju Food Store on Nanjing East Road has become a major highlight around the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Li Nan Ju is a long-established brand and a legend of the magic capital.
It is said that in 1902, before the fall of the Qing Dynasty, a Guangdong man named Zhong Anqiao came to Shanghai to pan for gold and opened a Li Nan Ju Cake Family on Nanjing East Road.
Cantonese people have a habit of drinking morning tea, and the tea produced by the cake family is very popular with them. On the other hand, in the old custom of Guangdong, when a rich family marries a daughter, they must order a large number of dragon and phoenix cakes to give to relatives and friends who come to Hexi. In order to cater to people's expectations of having more children and more grandchildren, this kind of cake is often named "Li Men".
Then after the landing of Li Nanju in the bustling downtown of Shanghai, because the name of the store is auspicious, the product is authentic, and it can be booked by telephone, delivered to the door, and the gift cakes and pastries required for the marriage of Guangdong nationals are purchased from Li Nanju.
Later, this custom also affected the indigenous people of Shanghai, who had children and grandchildren who got married, they went to LiNanju to buy dragon and phoenix cakes to give to relatives and friends, and they could also get a mouthful: eat the cakes and give birth to a boy.
(Lard peanuts are really delicious, now the blood sugar is high, dare not eat)
In the 1920s, due to housing disputes, Li Nanju had to move to Hongkou Tiantong Road, and later to Xingjiaqiao, North Sichuan Road.
After the outbreak of the Songhu War in August 1937, the Japanese ronin living in Hongkou often made trouble in the streets by taking advantage of the obscene power of the Japanese army, and Chinese all looked sideways. The owner of Li Nanju is Tu Qingjing, and at the same time, due to the entanglement of the store lease, he moved to the zhejiang road ningbo intersection of the public concession to continue business.
The management of Li Nan Ju is very flexible, according to the changes of the season, the refreshments have also changed, from hemp balls to spring rolls, from rice dumplings to Chongyang cakes, from chicken boy cakes to lard peanuts, from Mid-Autumn Moon Cake to char siu big buns, everything is fine. Sagema in particular is known for its beauty.
(Cantonese char siu puff pastry)
Sagema is a Manchu pastry, with rock sugar, cream, egg and white noodles kneaded into only inches of strips, baked on the stove or fried, pressed into large pieces, and then cut into small squares, sweet and crispy, milky, salty, old and young, is a fairly high-grade tea.
Brother Xipo said in a beautiful article in the supplement of the Xinmin Evening News: The origin of Sakima is probably not from the former Fushun and Shengjing areas, which is nurhaci's old lair. Nomads are good at concocting dairy products, and the main feature of a delicious saqi horse, the creamy taste must be sufficient, which can be corroborated. This is one of the reasons why Sachima is mistaken for an imported product by most people. Therefore, it is not so much a traditional famous spot in old Beijing as it is an appendage of the Manchus after they entered the Yan land.
in Sagema
How did Sachima in the north settle in Lingnan, thousands of miles away? The flow of food is really an interesting topic, and I will not list it today.
There is a point, Guangdong chefs and dim sum chefs, the vision is wider than the general place of people, Beijing snacks, a little foreign flavor, of course, worthy of "take doctrine", a little processing, has become a product of refreshment. In short, the Sachima of Li Nanju, once launched, was passed on by word of mouth.
Li Nanju is second to none in Shanghai's Cantonese tea industry, and is known as the "Four Residences" of Cantonese refreshments together with Tongfangju, Yizhenju and Qunfangju.
After Li Nanju moved away, it brought many inconveniences to the Guangdong residents of Hongkou. Until 1950, when the third generation of Li Nanju saw an advertisement for renting a façade house when passing through North Sichuan Road, he ordered the shop at No. 501 North Sichuan Road and opened a cake shop. When the old customer saw that the descendants of Li Nanju had returned, they encouraged him to say: "The descendants of Li Nanju have come to open a shop, know our tastes, and the business must be good." ”
The owner simply called the name of the shop "must be good".
In doing business, the top priority is to conform to public opinion.
(Guangdong Tea House)
In addition to retaining the characteristics of Cantonese-style pastries with heavy sugar and heavy oil, crispy skin filling and mellow milk, it has also launched a cheap and good snack - sesame paste.
Sesame paste is a Guangdong vendor carrying a burden to walk the streets and alleys to sell snacks, this burden is a copper pot wearing "cotton clothes" to keep warm, the other end is a washed bowl, if someone calls from afar, he will stand still, stand up on the spot, scoop a bowl into the pot, guests can relieve hunger when standing, which is a very strong scenery in Hongkou.
(sesame paste)
Sesame paste seems simple, but it is not easy to do well, a link mistake, sesame paste becomes thin. A good master not only prefers the ingredients, but also washes the production utensils cleanly, never borrows the hands of others, and ensures that the finished product is fragrant, sweet, thick and smooth, and the four characteristics cannot be less.
Sesame paste, like osmanthus sugar porridge, sells the most urban style in winter. In the sad days when the wind was calling and dripping water into ice, standing at the end of the street and drinking a bowl of hot water, he immediately became energetic, the wind under his feet, said thank you, and continued to run on the road of the human world.
(Cantonese hemp ball)
The middle-aged and elderly residents who once lived on Sichuan Road still remember the scene of standing on street corners and eating sesame paste. I don't know if there is sesame paste in the good food store now, but the scene of selling sesame paste in the streets and alleys can no longer be seen.
Shen Jialu is the chief writer and senior reporter of Xinmin Weekly. He is a member of the China Writers Association and a director of the Shanghai Writers Association. His works have won the 1990 "Bud" Literary Award, the 1994 "Guangzhou Literature and Art" Award, the 1996 "Mountain Flower" Award, the 1991 and 1996 "Shanghai Literature" Literary Award. In 2004, he published "Fashion Old Furniture" and "Looking for Old Furniture", showing the immortal charm of classic old furniture, leading readers to shuttle back and forth between classical and fashion, opening the window of cultural appreciation of old Western furniture, and becoming a must-read book for people who liked Old Western furniture in that era. He also loves to collect and play with ceramics and furniture, but he prefers to be treated like a foodie and present himself as a Shanghainese gourmet.
Shen Jialu's paintings
This article has been published with the author's permission, and the graphics and text are provided by the author
Special thanks to the old Shanghai flavor public micro support