This bowl of noodles has been exquisite for three thousand years
In the midst of a storm, eating a bowl of hot noodles is the most healing.
This October, Shanxi, Shaanxi and other northern provinces were hit by torrential rains and floods. In a village along the river in Xi'an, houses were damaged and roads were destroyed. More than 300 officers and men of the armed police rushed to rescue the disaster in the rain, and after a day and a night without eating, the villagers spontaneously made noodles and sent them.
The villagers said, "I want them to eat hot." ”
Photo/Screenshot of White Deer video
The bowl of noodles sent by the villagers is the heaviest bowl of noodles in the minds of northwestern people.
Cheeky noodles
Spicy or unspicious cheek noodles, which bowl do you want to eat?
Photography /zhangcaohuan, photo/market map network
Northwestern people love to eat noodles, will eat noodles, "a meal away from the noodles, the heart will be mào chaos", not to mention the beef noodles in Lanzhou, Gansu, "noodle gangster" Shaanxi has more than a hundred kinds of famous noodles. But even if there are many tricks, the status of the cheek noodles can never be replaced.
It is the first bowl of noodles to melt the frost in the early morning of autumn and winter, the first bowl of noodles that the wanderers most want to eat, the first bowl of noodles for feasting on relatives and friends, the first bowl of noodles for celebrating happy events and singing dramas every New Year's Festival, and the first bowl of noodles for worshiping ancestral gods... In the Northwest, eating cheeky noodles is a common occurrence and the highest etiquette.
Cheek noodles, steaming hot gas is the most "northwest".
Photography / Chen Cangzhi Fire
Qishan is not the only faction. From Guanzhong to Longyuan, from Hexi to Ningxia, this bowl of noodles has been eaten by northwestern people for three thousand years. It is like a spiritual base based on food, telling the rich cultural heritage of Chinese food since Zhou Qin.
01 Nine-character tips
A bowl of noodles "resume"
The noodles are meticulously crafted, which can be called the aggregators in northwest pasta. The most famous, of course, is qishan zhenzi noodles. The practice of the noodles in the northwest is roughly similar to that of the Qishan noodles.
Red, yellow, white, green, and black, each color has an allegory.
The "resume" of the cheeky noodles has only nine words: "thin, tendon, light, sour, spicy, fragrant, fried, thin, wang". If you want to make a bowl of authentic Qishan noodles, every word of this mantra is a level that cannot be underestimated.
"Thin, ribs, light"
Noodles made with a large knife
The requirements of qishan cheeks face noodles are almost harsh - not to pull the noodles, not to roll the noodles by hand, not to cut the noodles, but to cut the noodles.
Roll out the dough thinly, stack and compact it, and use a large knife to cut out the slender noodles. "Thin" means that the rolling noodles should be thin, and the cut noodles can make the noodles and soup taste good. The teacher of the cut noodles is as skillful as a farmer ploughing the ground, neatly and densely underground knives, and the cut noodles are ventilated, wide and narrow, long as a line and flexible, as thin as silk and continuous.
Big knife face, every knife is kung fu.
Photo/ Screenshot of the documentary "Spicy Zi Yue"
Shops that focus on noodles also call noodles "big knife noodles.". Old Shaanxi noodles, knife service. After eating, I wanted to roar a Qin cavity: "In order to find relatives, Gu De has a long way to go, climbing the mountain and wading into puguan..."
"Tendon" is the tendon road, and the noodles should be tendoned, mainly reflected in the kung fu of the noodles. In addition to the noodles, it also depends on the quality of the flour, and the high-gluten flour newly harvested in the Guanzhong Plain is not only white, but also tendon.
The noodles on the cheeky noodles should be as white as jade and crystal clear.
Photography / Xu Haiyang
"Light" refers to the smooth and uniform noodles made, which is mainly reflected in the rolling and cutting of the noodles. The noodles are boiled until nine ripe and cooled in cold water, which can also make the noodles smooth, but before pouring the soup, they should also use the noodle soup to heat up and remove the alkali taste. "Boil the lotus in the pot, pick the chopsticks to play the swing, fish in the bowl a line", such noodles are qualified.
"Fried, thin, wang"
See soup without meeting
Unlike the "non-northwest" noodles, the northwest noodles have soup, and they are "wide soup" - a bowl full of soup, and you can hardly see the noodles inside. "Thin" means that the soup is more faceted and less.
A spoonful of cheek soup, poured over the tip of the heart.
"Frying" is a northwestern dialect meaning "hot mouth". The soup of the cheek noodles must be "fried" to be delicious, and the spicy soup is hot and fragrant. "Wang" means that the oil of the soup should be wang, the soup color oil is bright, and a layer of chili oil is covered on the surface of the soup, and the main role of the oil is to maintain the temperature of the soup.
The cheeks of the cheeks are colorful and layered, with both meat and vegetarian cheeks, and there are also base dishes, side dishes and bleaching flowers in the vegetarian cheeks.
Lean meat cheeks, "hard dishes" in cheek noodles.
Lao Shaan makes meat dumplings, not fried or roasted, called "lán "lán". When the rice can be fried with meat and vegetables, add Qishan balsamic vinegar and Qin pepper noodles, burn with a low flame, the stimulation of vinegar becomes soft around the fingers, the meat is also soft and rotten and the grains are clear; you can also fry the meat separately, the stewed meat is spooned into the basin, cooled and solidified into a red fat paste, which cannot be dissolved in summer, not frozen in winter, and put into the soup when eating, always with a seductive aroma.
Dried broccoli in cheek noodles.
Photo/Visual China
The side dishes of the cheek noodles are very rich, indispensable is the yellow cauliflower, wood ear fungus, some people also regard the yellow cauliflower as the "soul" of the cheek noodles; the base dish is the local popular dish, autumn, winter and spring more carrots, summer more use of tomatoes and so on. Diced old tofu and potatoes are also regulars in the noodles.
Bleach is a dish that floats on the surface of a soup. Generally, egg cakes, garlic seedlings, and green onions cut into diamond shapes are selected. Throw the drifting vegetables inside, and the "color" and "taste" of the whole bowl of noodles are complete.
Inside the cheeky noodles, bleached with red oil.
"Sour, spicy, fragrant"
Gé flavor drops very much!
In Qishan, vinegar is a big thing for the villagers. To experience a long wait from the entry of the koji to the fermentation of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, of course, the wait is worth it - Qishan balsamic vinegar is the finishing touch of the cheek noodles.
Shaanxi people brew red oil peppers, but also indispensable balsamic vinegar.
Graph/Network
The Qin pepper powder in the red soup is the essence of the bright red oil, which makes people sweat at the tip of their noses and breathe a lot. There are ten monsters in Shaanxi, one of which is "oily spicy seeds are vegetables". The chili oil used in the noodles is the oily spicy seeds.
The last "incense" word is the overall feeling of eating the noodles, which comes from the noodles, from the soup, from all the raw materials of the noodles and the whole production process. In Qishan, a bowl of noodles is served when a guest is asked, "How does it taste?" Guests will always say, "Gé flavor drops are very much!" Presumably it means "very appetizing." Yes, the most prominent feature of the noodles is not sour or spicy, but precisely the "taste" - just the right "harmony".
Lean meat buns can not only be used in the noodles, but also sandwiched.
Just like the ensemble, the "sour" of the face noodles is the acid of "salt first"; although "wang" refers to the oil, it is not greasy at all because of the lead of vinegar; "spicy" is sour, oily, fragrant and spicy, rather than dry and spicy. If you feel greasy or spicy and inhale, you are not doing it authentically - qishan people say "cracked taste", which is the opposite of "yu taste".
02 Out of Qishan
Surround yourself with a circle of cheeky faces!
Since the introduction of chili peppers into China in the late Ming Dynasty, the noodles of Baoji in Xifu have been divided into two styles: Qishan Zhenzi noodles with peppers and Fufeng Zhenzi noodles without peppers. Whether spicy or fresh, the sour aroma of aged vinegar is common.
Fu Feng took a sip of incense, and took a dozen bowls of "Momada" at a time!
Photography / Glitter Ash, Picture / Figure Worm Creative
Based on the sour taste, the meat of the Fufeng noodles is mild and fragrant, and the soup base is also a clear light brown stewed with chicken soup; no spicy, more feminine atmosphere. To eat this noodle, you must use a small bowl the size of a palm, known as "a mouthful of incense", a small bowl is held, there is only one chopstick noodle in a bowl, wide soup poured on it, a rare bowl, ordinary people eat more than a dozen bowls at a time, it is not difficult.
Cheek noodles, "Xifu sour and spicy out of the head, Jingzhao oil wang heavy, Dongfu salty head." "Xifu is most famous for Qishan, and Jingzhao Xi'an is famous for Baqiao. Baqiao noodles, soup is the soul - bone broth clear taste foot, not to eat noodles, but to drink soup mainly, soup more noodles less, noodles have become a foil.
Wugong flag flower noodles, chicken soup as the base, sour and spicy fresh flavor.
Photography / Textile City Nomad, Photo / Figure Worm Creative
Then to Yang Ling, Wu Gong, the side dishes of the cheek noodles have more ingenuity. For example, tofu should be fried in oil first, then placed outdoors, frozen in the wind and snow, to create a mixture of flexible and crispy taste; and egg cakes, green onions, strips, to be cut into diamond shapes with a knife, floating in a bowl, stretched out, like a flag, therefore, the face here is also called "flag face".
Linyou blood noodles, with dry red noodles are the most distinctive.
Photography / Turi, Photo / Figureworm Creative
Linyou people work noodles. The noodles are no longer noodles, but blood noodles – flour is rolled into pieces with pig and sheep's blood, rolled thinly and rubbed with oil, finely chopped, steamed and dried. When the soup is ready, the blood noodles are added to the soup and soaked in a few minutes to eat, which is the world's earliest instant noodles. It tastes strong but not fishy, red but not spicy, and thick but not greasy.
Out of Shaanxi, the neighboring Qingyang in Gansu is also inseparable from the face of the face. The local folk song sings like this: "Turn around in eighteen provinces, but it is better than our Qingyang cheek noodles." "Northern Qingyang uses lamb as a cheek, which is more flavorful.
The "standard" of the Dingxi cheek noodles.
In Lanzhou and Dingxi, Gansu, the noodles can also be eaten with brine meat, and then a plate of tiger skin spicy seeds, full of drops! Lanzhou people make a pot of soup, in addition to eating noodles, you can also use the soup to make steamed buns. A bowl of cheek soup, a steamed bun or flower roll, broken into small pieces and soaked in the cheek soup, is also a delicacy.
03 Eat cheek noodles
Why not drink soup?
There is also a more "strange" custom of eating noodles: only eat noodles, not soup.
In the former flowing water mat in the northwest countryside, this soup was not poured, but poured back into the pot and continued to boil. "Flowing noodles, immovable old soup", outsiders must feel indecent, and now for the sake of hygiene, this situation is rarely seen. The soup does not return to the pot, and it is reluctant to pour it out, and the children eat the noodles and often drink several bowls.
In the countryside of Guanzhong, there used to be a flowing water mat, and the soup was to be returned to the pot.
So, why is there such a custom of eating noodles?
According to legend, in the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, King Wen of Zhou and his subordinates ate together, and there were still a few mouthfuls of soup left in the bowl, and the subordinates poured the soup back into the pot and said to King Wen of Zhou, Let us also dip your blessings. Thus, there is the "Fu bazi" saying that the soup returns to the pot. As for the big knife of the cheek and the face, it also corresponds to a legend - the zhou wen king's big knife slashed the dragon, chopped the dragon meat, and made a cheek. Later, King Wu of Zhou improved the pork cheeks, so there is a saying that "King Wu Zi Wen Wang Mian".
At the last meal of the feast, the cheek noodles are plated on the table.
These legends are exaggerated and bizarre, and the credibility is not as good as the Tang Dynasty long life noodles, as well as the Ming Dynasty wedding noodles, etc., and most of the raw materials for the cheek noodles eaten today did not appear in the Zhou Dynasty. Nevertheless, in the land of Zhou Xing, the ritual custom of eating face noodles is still a mirror of Zhou Li.
Some scholars have researched that the Qishan Face noodles originated from the "completion" ceremony of the Corpse Sacrifice System in the Zhou Dynasty, that is, first worship the gods and ancestral spirits, and then the rest is the turn of Junqing, and finally the average person. The soup left over from eating the noodles cannot be poured out, and it must be returned to the pot, that is, the meaning of the word "Yu" of "Finished Yu".
Wedding banquets, children's birthdays, there is always a shame noodles.
This custom has existed for a long time in Qishan, whether it is to worship ancestors during the New Year's Festival, or to do red and white weddings, the first bowl of noodles is not served first, and the younger generation goes out of the door to pour noodle soup twice, symbolizing the sacrifice of the gods and goddesses, and the remaining noodle soup, that is, "Fu Bazi", is poured on the ancestral spirit tablet in the main hall. The gods of heaven and earth and the ancestor gods have finished pouring soup in front of them, which means that the ancestors of heaven and earth have already eaten, and only then can people move their chopsticks and noodles.
Today, cheeky noodles also mean harvest and harmony. At the feast in the northwest, there is always a bowl of steaming cheek noodles, and some people would rather give up the dumplings for the New Year: eat lasagna for thirty nights, everything is relieved, and the noodles are boiled on the first day of the New Year, the water is long, and the taste is satisfactory.
Eat a bowl of cheek noodles during the cooling season, and the warmth reaches the heart.
This bowl of noodles, the weight of the portion, the cultural etiquette of three thousand years, the essence of wheat through winter and spring, and the various accompaniments of Tiannanhaibei are all carried in one bowl. Thin, strong, light noodles, fried, thin, Wang soup, sour, spicy, fragrant taste, a bowl of cheek noodles, always let people eat well, the lungs ironed, the aftertaste is endless.
Text | Li Yi
Cover photo |
Header image | Visual China
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