It looks inconspicuous little dumplings, and everyone who tries it will fall in love with it.
In 2017, a website in the United States surveyed 25 countries around the world and rated the most popular snacks in each country. In the United States, which is famous for its fast food culture, people's favorite food is doughnut; in China, which is famous for its cuisine, it is this little dumpling that "presses the crowd".
Xiaolongbao, also known as Xiaolong Steamed Buns, was developed from the Kaifeng soup bun in the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty. It is said that during the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty, a modern form of small dumplings appeared in present-day Changzhou, and they formed their own characteristics in various places. To this day, it is a representative food in Jiangsu and Zhejiang. And with the passage of history, different genres have gradually formed.
Today, let's talk about the small cages in Wuxi, Shanghai, Changzhou and Nanjing.
wow! Such a famous small dumpling
In overseas Chinese restaurants, such as Spain, Xiaolongbao is well-known among diners, and because of its delicious taste, some Spanish restaurants or bars also sell food similar to Chinese Xiaolongbao, called Spanish-made Chinese sandwich bread.
Since the 1990s, a large number of Chinese immigrants have entered Spain, and Chinese restaurants have begun to increase, and Xiaolongbao has become a staple food for Chinese restaurants. On the menu, Xiaolongbao is often written as "Xiaolong" and "Chinese Xiaolong", and some shops simply write Xiaolongbao as the English name "Bruce Lee" (Bruce Lee) in order to attract business.
After 2000, the "little dragon bun" changed again.
In order to commemorate the outstanding contribution of martial arts superstar Bruce Lee to martial arts films, television stations in various countries have opened up special features on Bruce Lee movies. In Spain, colorful posters printed with Bruce Lee can be seen in the streets and alleys, and Spanish children are a Bruce lee and a Chinese kung fu.
At this time, the meaning of "Xiaolong Bun" changed again, and some restaurants interpreted "Xiaolong Bao" as "the favorite Chinese meat bread of martial arts superstar Bruce Lee".
The Spanish name of "Little Dragon Bun" is "Bruce lee", and when people order food, they say to the running hall, "I want Bruce lee", and the running hall knows that the diners want Chinese steamed buns. Well-known abroad, famous all over the world, Xiaolong bun is undoubtedly a famous food in snacks.
Nanxiang small cage steamed buns
Nanxiang Xiaolong is also known as Nanxiang Xiaolong Steamed Bun.
Nanxiang Small Cage Steamed Bun was originally named "Tight Fermented Small Cage Big Meat Steamed Bun", also known as Nanxiang Big Steamed Bun, which is called because of its large filling. It has been passed down to more than 100 years, and it is said that the inventor is named Huang Mingxian, who is the owner of a restaurant called Rihuaxuan in Nanxiang, Shanghai.
Huang Mingxian, formerly known as Zhan Dasheng, was born in 1852 in a peasant family in Shangsi Township, Hangzhou, and was later adopted by the Taiping Army and brought to Nanxiang. In the first year of Tongzhi (1862), when the Taiping Army collapsed, it was sent to the Nursery for adoption. Later, he was adopted by Huang Mou, the owner of the old flagpole Rihuaxuan Cake Shop, and changed his name to Huang Mingxian.
After the death of Boss Huang in the tenth year of Tongzhi, he inherited Rihuaxuan and changed the cake shop into a dim sum shop that also operated steamed buns, wontons and noodles.
△ Nanxiang steamed bun shop
In the 1870s, he experimented with adding jelly to the pork filling, folding it with a dough and wrapping it up, and when steaming, the jelly became a liquid. That's the soup in the cage we eat.
The production of Nanxiang Xiaolong is very strict, with a total of nine processes, including noodles, waking noodles, pressing noodles, rubbing strips, plucking, kneading, rolling, filling, and cooking. Logically, except for the use of machines in the noodle step, the rest of the steps are all handmade.
Due to its exquisite production and focus on quality, it has become a famous spot in Nanxiang. Nanxiang Xiaolong steamed bun is known for its thin skin, large filling, juicy, fresh taste and beautiful shape. The use of fine white flour is tightly fermented as the skin, and every two flours must make 10 steamed buns, which can be seen that its skin is thin; the fine leg meat is used as the filling, without MSG, the meat skin is boiled with chicken soup into a jelly, mixed into the filling, to take its freshness, and make more juicy; the filling is sprinkled with a small amount of fine sesame seeds to take its fragrance; according to different seasons, add crab powder or shrimp or spring shoots to take the freshness; each one adds 3 dollars, weighed with a whip, to ensure the quality, and the small steamed bun has 14 dishes of each dish, which is really small and beautiful.
When it comes out of the cage, each steamed bun is exquisitely clear, and some writers call it a "transparent steamed bun". Moreover, when Rihuaxuan's steamed buns come out of the cage, they will check themselves, take any one and put it in a small plate, use chopsticks to poke the skin, and if the juice is less than one plate, it will not be sold, thus winning credibility.
Later, rihuaxuan's steamed bun masters were hired by Guyi Garden or set up their own Songhexuan business, and the town's taverns were imitated one after another.
The Nanxiang people in Shanghai also invited Master Nanxiang to open a Nanxiang mantou shop in the Shanghai City God Temple and a Guyiyuan mantou shop on Xizang Road.
△ Nanxiang Xiaolong in Shanghai
Nowadays, Nanxiang Xiaolong steamed bun is well-known in Shanghai, known to women and children, and has spread throughout the country under the name of "Shanghai Xiaolong", becoming an outstanding representative of Shanghai's traditional dim sum snacks. The gourmand Tang Lusun once commented: "The thick and thin rolling on the upper and lower sides is very symmetrical, and it is only complete, and it will never leak the soup."
In 2007, nanxiang small cage making technology was even included in the first batch of "intangible cultural heritage" list by Shanghai.
Wuxi small cage
The first series of CCTV's "China on the Tip of the Tongue" specifically introduces the sweetness of Wuxi cuisine, and Xiaolongbao fully reflects the sweetness. The sweet and fresh small dumplings are actually wuxi new small cages.
In Wuxi, there are two kinds of small dumplings, traditional and new. There is a legend about the origin of the traditional Xiaolong steamed buns, when the Qianlong Emperor went down to Jiangnan and stayed in Wuxi Huishan Jichang Garden, the owner of the Qin family used xiaolong steamed buns as a snack to entertain the emperor, and the emperor praised Xiaolong. This tradition has been passed down from generation to generation by the Qin family, with crab powder cages as a must.
△ Today's Jichang Garden
At present, the traditional Wuxi Xiaolong and its craft are only one left in Wuxi, that is, Huishan Yiqin Garden.
Compared with the new small cage, the traditional small cage is more "dead" and the appearance is not full. But the skin is very thin, the taste is more fresh, not as sweet as the new style. Later, after the Republic of China, a new style of small cage that integrated shanghai flavors appeared, and the traditional small cage basically disappeared.
The new Wuxi cage, which is common today, was invented by Wang Xingji from the 11th year of the Republic of China. The founder of the shop, Wang Ting'an, whose father used to work as a chef in Shanghai, learned a craft from an early age. Later, he set up a stall to sell blunt bread, rented a storefront next to the Wuxi Public Garden, named "Wang Xingji", and began to sell his new Wuxi dumplings that blended the characteristics of Wuxi and Shanghai.
Some people say that the popularity of sweet and fresh new-style small cages is related to the popular Jiangsu and Zhejiang cuisine in this area in the early Republic of China.
△ Wang Xingji is now the largest blunt and small cage dim sum shop in Wuxi, and also won the honor of "China Time-honored Brand" in 2011
Changzhou crab yellow small cage
Crab yellow small dumplings, also known as crab small dumplings, are a traditional snack specialized in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province. It is the Wanhua Tea House in Changzhou Xiaohe along the south of the pontoon bridge, which was first created in the light years of the Qing Dynasty. Every year around the Mid-Autumn Festival, osmanthus flowers are in full bloom and supplied.
Unlike the sweet freshness of Wuxi, Changzhou Xiaolong is a salty route. In addition, the crab yellow dumpling has the characteristics of "thin and transparent skin, rich marinade, fragrant crab, fat but not greasy, rich juice, and tender meat filling". People who can eat it will choose to supplement it with balsamic vinegar and tender ginger, which has a better flavor.
There are three kinds of small dumplings: follow the number, pair setting, and crab. "Random number" is not added crab oil, "pair setting" is a cage of buns with six crab oil, the other six are only without crab oil, "crab" is all crab oil.
A cage of buns is also called a guest, so the old Changzhou people eat small steamed buns often called this: "two guests to set". Or: "Ten guests plus crabs, I'm going to take them to Shanghai."
Old eaters generally only order "right set", they think: eat crab bun only one with a number, a crab with flowers to eat, in order to fully appreciate the deliciousness of crab, if you always eat crab, the taste in the mouth will be somewhat dull, more and more do not feel the umami taste of crab. Hence the conventional name "pair setting".
Changzhou plus crab small dumpling skin thin filling large brine, pay attention to a "would rather people wait for steamed buns, not steamed buns and other people". That's how best you can taste.
When eating, you should take the small dumpling out of the balsamic vinegar dish and soak it, use chopsticks to pick it up, the steamed bun is a little to the outside, bite open the skin on the bottom side, first carefully suck the delicious brine, and then soak the opened steamed bun into the vinegar, let the vinegar enter the steamed bun, and then put the whole small dumpling into the mouth.
Nanjing soup buns
Nanjing generally calls Xiaolongbao "soup bun". Although the people of Nanjing do not study the difference between the two, they can also find similarities and differences when they are more realistic.
The two are also thin-skinned and thick fillings, but the small dumplings are closed upwards, and the Nanjing soup buns are down. It is said that it is to keep the soup from being exposed. But now there are also some soup buns that are closed up.
The most representative of Nanjing soup buns may be chicken soup buns, which are made with pork filling + chicken soup skin jelly. It is very common, like fresh broth buns.
If you want to say the most characteristics of Nanjing, it should be a chrysanthemum leaf soup bun, which is actually a kind of wild vegetable, chopped and mixed into the meat filling, adding a few hints of wild vegetable fragrance.
The writer Liang Qiushi once wrote in the book "Yashe Talks about Eating", "The crease that catches the small dumpling is suddenly lifted, gently bites the skin of the small dumpling, and sucks the soup juice into the stomach." And the pleasure of eating is between the mention and the inhalation."
In addition to the above-mentioned Small Cages in Shanghai, Wuxi, Changzhou and Nanjing, there are also Small Cage Buns in Sichuan, Soup Dumplings in Kaifeng, Steamed Buns in Wuhan and so on. Such a small and humble Chinese cage, but it has flown for a hundred years and is loved by foreign friends, which is enough to see the charm of our Chinese cuisine.