Yesterday was the Mid-Autumn Festival, and the indispensable food is the mooncake. From the beginning of memory, every year is approaching the Mid-Autumn Festival, there will always be a lot of mooncakes at home, of which the highest exposure rate is the apricot blossom floor mooncake. After becoming a mother now, I did not expect that my child would love the bean paste mooncake in the apricot blossom building, and I would have to buy one or two when I passed by. Of course, the price of mooncakes has risen a lot this year, and a Cantonese bean paste mooncake has been sold to 9.8 yuan, and the price is still quite expensive. In response, let me sort out the story about our famous Shanghai brand "Apricot Blossom Building" mooncake.
Picture 1 Apricot Blossom Building MoonCake
The origin of mooncakes
There are many theories about the origin of mooncakes, and most of them are related to famous people in history. I think one of the more reliable theories is that the ancient Chinese emperors had a spring festival day and an autumn moon festival. On the night of the fifteenth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, the moon is closest to the earth, and the moon is the largest, roundest and brightest, so it is generally chosen to sacrifice the moon on this day. During the reign of Emperor Taizong of the Northern Song Dynasty, Zhao Guangyi of the Song Dynasty officially designated August 15 as the Mid-Autumn Festival in Kaifeng, the capital city, which happened to be the middle of the autumn of the year, so it was also called the Mid-Autumn Festival. In the "Zhou Li Chunguan", a series of sacrifice activities were recorded: "Mid-Autumn Festival Night Greeting Cold, Mid-Autumn Festival Offering, autumn equinox sunset moon (sacrifice moon)". Mooncakes were originally used to offer sacrifices to the moon god, and later this custom gradually became popular among the people. Because the shape of the moon cake is like a full moon, it is usually eaten by the whole family sitting around the moon, so it is given the meaning of family reunion.
Fig. 2 The ancients worshipped the moon god
Su Dongpo, a famous scholar of the Northern Song Dynasty, once used the verse "Small cakes are like chewing the moon, there are crisps and carrots" to describe the moon cakes in "Leaving Farewell and Honesty", which shows that the mooncakes at that time were already filled with butter sugar. According to the "Shanghai Tongzhi", the traditional ceremonies of the Mid-Autumn Festival in Shanghai mainly include the days before the festival, relatives and friends walking around, the separated children visiting their parents, and choosing moon cakes, wine, pears, lotus and other festivals. At night, the whole family eats mooncakes, and when there is a family outside, leave a small piece to show reunion. Rural commoners also have homemade pumpkin cakes, collapsed cakes as mooncakes, into the modern society, with the development of industry and commerce, began to appear commercially available Su-style mooncakes, followed by Cantonese, Beijing-style, Chao-style and other factions.
Figure 3 The four major factions of the common Shanghai mooncake
The "Cantonese-style mooncakes" and "Su-style mooncakes" that Shanghainese usually eat do not actually refer to the transmission from Guangdong, but were pioneered by Suzhounese and Cantonese people in Shanghai. Su-style mooncakes with puff pastry to make the skin, that is, with dry puff pastry (oil and flour kneaded together) wrapped in water and oil noodles (oil, water, flour kneading), after repeated flattening, folding, baking or frying, the water in the water and oil noodles peel off and become brittle, the puff pastry noodles are isolated from the water and oil surface layers to prevent adhesion, the finished pieces are thin and crispy, leaving gaps in the middle, thus forming a unique crispy effect. The filling wrapped in the middle is the fruit, bean paste, rose, etc. due to the oil in the puff pastry. Pure vegetarian mooncakes are basically Su-style. The Cantonese mooncake crust is soft and the printed pattern on the surface is clearly recognizable, especially the color, blonde and shiny, and the shape is small. The filling is delicate and soft, cut into a small piece, slowly chewed, the taste spreads on the tongue, making people reluctant to swallow immediately. The "Apricot Blossom Building" mooncake is the representative of cantonese mooncake.
The founding of the Apricot Blossom Building
After the opening of Shanghai in 1843, China's shipping and trade center shifted from Guangzhou to Shanghai, and many Guangdong people entered Shanghai with foreign companies, and the proportion of Guangdong immigrants in Shanghai increased significantly.
Xinghualou was founded in the first year of Xianfeng (1851) of the Qing Dynasty and is located in the Hongkou District of Shanghai. Founded by a Cantonese named Shengzai, it started as an open-door supper shop that offered Cantonese desserts and porridge for late-night foraging pedestrians. During the day, it mainly sells some Guangzhou-style snacks and dishes, and the business is very good, so the store is gradually expanded. According to the advertising materials available at the time, the store was renamed "Shengchang Jia Brown Restaurant" in December 1876, which is also known as "Shengchang Cafe". In December 1877, it was renamed "Shengchang Fan Restaurant", which is what we call a Western restaurant today. In 1883, the "Shengchang" was moved from a relatively quiet corner of Hongkou to the more lively Sima Road, which is now Fuzhou Road, which is the predecessor of the "XinghuaLou".
Figure 4 Notice of relocation of Xinghua Building published in the declaration
At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the area around Fuzhou Road was also the time when it became lively. In 1885, the Tian'an Hall in Maijia Circle on Shandong Road brought overseas Chinese to gather, and newspapers and periodicals, pen and ink notes fans, and instrument stationery industries were successively created, which further led to the emergence of surrounding theater gardens and tea houses, and the result of the intersection and collision of Chinese and Western cultures, new and old cultures in this area was also reflected in the catering industry: Chinese and Western restaurants rose with it. [1]
Guangdong people Hong Jiru and Chen Shengfang looked at the reputation of small and medium-sized shops and the market mouth, and plated into the Fan Restaurant, while operating Cantonese snack refreshments, while producing various kinds of gift cakes. In 1913, the then manager Ou Yunan expanded the small shop into an old-fashioned two-story building, hired a celebrity chef for the first time, and began to expand from dessert snacks to wine and banquets, cooking Cantonese famous dishes. In 1927, Xinghualou recommended Li Jinhai, the shop's master chef who specializes in Cantonese cuisine, as its manager. After Li took office, he was ambitious, and seeing that the supply of snacks could no longer meet the needs of commercial social interaction, he proposed to increase the business such as feasts. To this end, Li Jinhai raised funds to set up the "Xinghualou Shengji Co., Ltd.", and then built a four-story hotel with a seven-bay façade and steel bone cement structure on the original site, with a snack restaurant on the shop and a takeaway counter to supply Guangdong souvenirs. The second and third floors specialize in wine and dishes, and there are five large and small restaurants. The fourth floor was specially built a "boat hall", hanging celebrity calligraphy and paintings, the interior was arranged according to the full set of mahogany furniture that wu Tiecheng, the mayor of Shanghai of the Kuomintang at that time, and specially customized some antique glazed porcelain products in Jingdezhen, and the restaurant was decorated with antique and elegant, specially elegant and quiet, specially designed for the service of the rich and powerful merchants and dignitaries. Since then, Xinghualou has attracted a large number of industrial and commercial circles, military and political circles, with a great reputation, prosperous business, and a growing reputation. In addition to serving authentic Cantonese cuisine, it also serves European and American cuisine. [1]
Figure 5 The share capital of "Xinghualou Shengji Co., Ltd."
The origin of the name "Apricot Blossom Building"
Speaking of the origin of the name of the "Apricot Blossom Building", there is also a saying. After the apricot blossom building was put in, it was called "Tanhua Building", and although the business of the cantonese restaurant that just opened was good, it was not very famous. There is a middle school teacher, Su Jun (Su Baohua), who is both an old customer of the store and an old friend of the hotelier. This person suggested to the manager: after the expansion, the business is good, and there should be a graceful name. After the boss heard it, he agreed with his heart and asked Su Jun to express his opinion. This Mr. Su used the Tang Dynasty poet Du Mu's "Rain during the Qingming Dynasty, roadside pedestrians want to break their souls." Asking where the restaurant was, the shepherd boy pointed to the apricot blossom village. For the sake of evidence, it is recommended to use "apricot blossom", the boss was very happy after listening to it, and felt that this name was both elegant and loud, so he named it "Apricot Blossom Building". [2]
In 1930, Zhu Ruzhen (a Cantonese) at the end of the Qing Dynasty also specially wrote a signboard for the XinghuaLou. The font is beautiful, hanging in the middle of the shop on the ground floor, this signboard has survived all the storms and waves, and is hung high at the entrance of the historical exhibition hall of Xinghualou Food Co., Ltd. in Pujiang Town, Minhang District.
Figure 6 The signboard of the Apricot Blossom Building written by Zhu Ruzhenti
After the renovation, although the name of the Xinghualou store was changed, some of the calligraphy and paintings of the original store were still retained. A more typical woodcut of about one meter and sixty square meters, called "Tanhua Tu", depicts the shape of the Yuanyuan Tanhua, with vivid scenes of the three eyes and the riding of the horse to explore the flowers. Woodcut on both sides of a couplet "Long sword with a glass of wine, tall buildings thousands of miles deep." At that time, it had just opened, and celebrities also came to congratulate him, Zhang Taiyan gave a couplet "Dense juice can quench the thirst of the highway, and the river fish is to relieve the worries of the giant king", the horizontal batch is to give Su Baohua, who is the starting point of the Xinghua Building, "Po Shu Zun Li", and the Kuomintang elder Yu Renyou gave the couplet as "Poetry and Painting Meaning Wang Mo jie, the ship carries the book Sound Of the Rice People." "Wait... At that time, these calligraphy and paintings were decorated in the lobby, the shop hall and the staircase, and were still preserved until before the "Cultural Revolution", but they suffered the impact of the "Cultural Revolution" and were smashed by the four olds.
Become a good place for celebrities to feast
By the 1930s, Xinghualou was booming in business and became more and more famous. In order to expand the influence on the façade also did enough advertising, the outer wall with cement round edge carved pattern, the inside with wood as writing, vermilion lacquer scribbled "ingenious European and American dishes, special Chinese feast". Under the eaves of each floor, the characteristics and business scope of the restaurant are marked with black glass gold characters: the ground floor hangs the whole table of the Big Han, hanging stove pig, duck, seafood stir-fry, casual snacks, Guangdong wonton, package feasts, European and American dishes. Hanging on the second floor: dragon and phoenix cake, refined biscuits, seasonal famous points, four-hour fresh fruit, canned food, Chinese and Western wine, two ocean seafood. The sign on the third floor is: this building has a gorgeous auditorium, specializing in wedding banquets, refined cakes and peaches, official ceremony treasures, and everything. The characteristics of the restaurant's business projects can be seen by customers on the road.
Figure 7 The xinghualou storefront on Fuzhou Road in the 1930s
In the 1930s and 1940s, the business of Xinghualou was at its peak. At that time, the most famous were Cantonese cuisine and rice dumplings, lashi, dragon and phoenix cakes, etc. The fame of mooncakes was not very large, and Wu Tiecheng, then the mayor of Shanghai under the Kuomintang, preferred cantonese cuisine to eat apricot blossom buildings, and he himself was also a Cantonese and became a regular visitor to apricot blossom buildings. Wu was invited to entertain guests and set up banquets in the Xinghua Building, and wu was invited to banquets by political dignitaries and celebrities, and those who came to the Xinghua Building at that time were: Li Zongren, Wang Jingwei, Sun Ke, Chen Gongbo, Jin Jinrong, Du Yuesheng, Zhu Jiehua (Minister of Education), Huang Pethui (Minister of Foreign Affairs), Yu Hongjun, secretary general of the municipal government, and Chen Xianfu, a banker, who were also regular customers of the Xinghua Building. Wu Tiecheng came to the Xinghua Building to be located on the fourth floor of the "Boat Hall". So that later diners have followed suit and chosen to set up a banquet on the fourth floor. The owner also expanded his business scope, going out to cook food, service, delivery and later company dishes. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, a large number of employees of Japanese foreign firms almost all their meals were covered in the Apricot Blossom Building, including Mitsubishi Corporation and Tohashi Foreign Firm.
In June 1934, Xinghualou opened a small new unit, the Cold Snack Department, which sold a variety of cold drinks and various pastries at low prices. After the opening of the snack shop, diners flocked to the restaurant. Men and women who are often off work go to buy some cooked food to add to dinner, and there are also mothers who buy pastries for their hungry children to go back to as snacks. Every New Year's Festival, there will be a long queue in front of the window of the snack department, and everyone will buy a few boxes to visit relatives and friends and honor the elders.
After liberation, the Xinghua Building was jointly operated by public and private enterprises, and after several renovations and transformations, the restaurant changed from the original four floors to the current five floors. The façade is decorated with large pieces of brown glass, the door protrudes from the brown canopy, and the signboard of the two groups of golden apricot blossom buildings is very eye-catching above the east and west gates. Downstairs, there are special counters for snack takeaway and lak-style food, in the middle is a popular restaurant serving fast food and light meals, and there are 8 restaurants (rooms) on the second to fourth floors, totaling 1200 seats, serving refreshment drinks and hosting festive feasts. A hundred tables of banquets can be placed at a time, thousands of people can eat at the same time, with exquisite private rooms, central air conditioning, more perfect equipment, and exquisite decoration. On the fifth floor, there is also a pastry workshop, warehouses, dormitories, etc. Due to the fine selection of ingredients, delicious taste, light and delicious, reflecting the strong Cantonese flavor, it is well received by Chinese and foreign customers. Chen Yi, the first mayor of Shanghai, came to xinghualou for dinner, and the family of U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy also came. Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan compatriots, and overseas Chinese returned to the mainland and made a special trip to find the Apricot Blossom Building for dinner. The famous dishes of Xinghualou are: open oven char siu, crispy roasted duck, Xishi shrimp, oyster sauce slippery beef, spike fragrant slippery fish rot, oil-soaked long forest pomfret and snake-based snake feast, snake soup, etc. There are also a variety of Cantonese and Western-style pastries, and former mayor Wang Daohan left the words "Qunxian Bizhi" after he came to the restaurant to eat. [3]
Try out the mooncakes
The Mid-Autumn MoonCake of Xinghualou has a history of more than 50 years, with a unique formula, and has been rated as a high-quality product in Shanghai with excellent color, aroma and taste, and was rated as a high-quality product of the Ministry of Commerce in 1983, and is exported to Beijing, Guangzhou, Nanyang and Europe and the United States.
Figure 8 Apricot Blossom Building Mooncake Gift Box Packaging
In 1928, the Apricot Blossom Building, which started with Cantonese cuisine, began to make mooncakes on trial. The mooncakes in the Apricot Blossom Building are now well-known, but they were not famous at that time. Xinghualou manager Li Jinhai is very business acumen, at that time the most famous Cantonese mooncakes in Shanghai were Guanshengyuan, Tao Taoju and Jinfang cakes, Li Jinhai adopted a very simple method, that is, we Chinese the best "cottage", he bought these three mooncakes, please taste the master and then imitate, develop their own taste.
However, it is still difficult to seize the market by relying on the taste of "cottage". Li Jinhai aimed at the most famous pottery restaurant mooncake, Tao Tao restaurant is located in Sichuan North Road, when the xinghualou mooncake sales are not good, Li Jinhai on the one hand stepped up research technology, improve quality, on the other hand in the tao tao restaurant opposite the temporary rent a façade, pick up the bunting flag, please play music, hire a beautiful lady to sing with the tao tao restaurant. The first year ended in failure, the second year regrouped, improved the quality, worked meticulously, and continued to sing the right stage, so that the apricot blossom house mooncake finally hit.
In terms of marketing methods, Xinghualou is also unique. They booked an advertisement with the newspaper a month before the Mid-Autumn Festival, but the advertisement had no pictures and text, just a large circle. It was not until shortly before the Mid-Autumn Festival that the pattern of Chang'e running to the moon appeared in this large circle, and Shanghai people suddenly woke up and flocked to the Apricot Blossom Building to buy mooncakes. The store also invited the popular advertising painter at that time to draw "Bright Moon Chang'e Map" as a mooncake packaging box, And Shanghainese and even the people of the whole country knew that this was the mooncake of Shanghai XinghuaLou when they looked at the packaging box. [4] The pattern of Chang'e Running Moon has also long been deeply rooted in people's hearts and has become a collective memory for generations.
Figure 9 The apricot blossom building mooncake advertisement on the "Declaration"
The picture above is an advertisement for apricot blossom house mooncakes published in the "Declaration" on September 17, 1948. At that time, due to the current situation, prices soared, but merchants still insisted on limiting the maximum price of five corners per mooncake. [5] It was well received by the public.
Since then, the apricot blossom house mooncake has continuously improved the process, from the selection of materials to the processing, it has a unique style, and has set up a brand in the hearts of the citizens. Apricot Blossom Lou MoonCake is exquisite in materials, beautiful in appearance, golden in color, sufficient in oil and water, thin skin and rich in filling, and crispy and delicious. There are also many colors of mooncakes, including: lotus paste, coconut paste, sausage, hundred fruits, bean paste, ma rong, bean paste, Chang'e benyue, phoenix tribute moon, double dragon pan moon, three pools of the moon, moon palace treasure box and so on. Since then, the apricot blossom house mooncake has become famous in Shanghai and has become a must-have gift for the Mid-Autumn Festival. Because the mooncakes of Xinghualou are different from those of Suzhou, they are made by baking with half-awake hair noodles as the skin, and Shanghainese people call the mooncakes "Cantonese-style mooncakes".
Nowadays, in the apricot blossom house mooncake, the traditional rose bean paste, coconut paste, lotus paste, and five kernels are called the "four king kongs". Among them, my favorite is the apricot blossom house rose bean paste mooncake. Bean paste is made of Red Beans from Haimen Da Hong Pao, sautéed and molted and mixed with heavy red rose sauce, oil and sugar. When making mooncakes, in addition to the traditional basic processes of making skin, waking skin, mixing filling, filling, splitting, weighing, etc., the process of wrapping mooncakes depends on the housekeeping skills of the mooncake master. "After training, the mooncake crust should be completely wrapped in the filling, not a single trace can be exposed, and the surrounding area is very even." Shen Quanhua, the fifth generation of intangible heirs of mooncake handmade, said, "It may take 10 years to do this alone, and I have been doing it for nearly 20 years, and I still feel that I have not done it perfectly." ”
In 2007, the process of making apricot blossom house mooncakes was rated as shanghai municipal intangible cultural heritage. In order to better protect these precious heritages, Xinghualou decided to hide the "secret recipe" and the unique process of 16 mooncake making processes that condensed the painstaking efforts of generations into the safe deposit box of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, making it an intellectual property exclusively owned by Xinghualou and can be passed on from generation to generation. This set of precious recipe materials involves a total of 109 unique mooncake recipe processes, which integrate the painstaking efforts and experiences of generations of Xinghualou.
Figure 10 Apricot Blossom Building Rose Bean Paste Mooncake
remark:
[1] 【Memories at Sea】Apricot Blossom House: The Delicious Taste Of Time. Shangguan.7/27
[2] The information is from the official website of Xinghualou
[3] Apricot Blossom Building- National Cuisine, Going global. XU Yingying,LIU Chenxin. Taste and Tao Chapter 11.2021/1/18
[4] Centennial Apricot Blossom Building: The Dusty Past of the Collision of Cantonese Cuisine and "Haipai". Welcome.2019/8/14
[5] [Memory] For more than a hundred years, how have Shanghainese talked about mooncakes?.Shanghai Release.2020/10/1