In the yard of my hometown, there are several toon trees. Spring is coming, the spring breeze is blowing, the spring rain is moist, and the branches of the toon trees are bursting with ochre red buds.
The buds gradually grew, and on the eve of the valley rain, most of them grew. The mother plucked the young shoots one by one, washed them, put them on the cutting board, sprinkled with fine salt, kneaded them, and then put them into a porcelain jar, planted some coarse salt, and pickled them. After ten days and a half months, you can take it out one after another and eat it, savor it, and leave your lips and teeth fragrant.
Toon buds are a rare vegetable that grows on trees in the world. In the yard, picking toon buds on the mountain, or frying or mixing and enjoying toon buds, has become one of the expectations of many people for spring.
Picking toon buds for sale.
01
Toon buds were once listed as tributes
It has been eaten for more than two thousand years
Toon sprouts can be eaten in a variety of ways, using them to scramble eggs and mix tofu, and the umami flavor is stronger.
Tofu with tofu sprouts is not only favored by ordinary people, but also praised by gourmets. Writer and gourmet Wang Zengqi made and evaluated tofu in this way - the tender toon head of the bud leaf was "chopped into pieces, mixed with tofu, and a few drops of sesame oil" and "a spoonful of entrance, three springs do not forget". The writer Liang Shiqiu has a famous collection of essays called "Yashe Talks About Eating". In the book, he is blunt: "My favorite is tofu mixed with tofu. ”
Tracing the history of the consumption of toon buds on the mainland, it has been more than 2,000 years. Toon sprouts became the dish of ordinary people at the latest in the Han Dynasty.
There are lychees in the south and toon in the north. At that time, toon and lychee were carefully selected as tributes and sent to the capital to be enshrined in the emperor. During the Tang, Ming and Qing dynasties, toon buds were also included in the list of tributes.
Toon buds can also be seen in the menu of the old Confucius House. "Imaza benshi went to Tai'an Prefecture to comprador to toon buds... A total of three hundred pounds, sent to the house for application. This is the record in the document of the Confucius Government urging the toon bud on March 20, the eighteenth year of the Ming Dynasty (1590), (for details, see the "Study of the Food Affairs of the Archives of the Yansheng Gongfu" written by Zhao Rongguang). It can be seen that the famous and prestigious families are also good at this mouth.
02
Toon emits a delicate fragrance
The Doctor unravels the mysteries
Since ancient times, why do people favor toon buds? The reason is that it can emit a faint fragrance, which makes people addicted and salivating. As for what exactly causes the fragrant smell of toon buds, it was previously only a general explanation that toon buds contain volatile aromatic organics such as toonin.
Recently, Shi Jun, Ph.D. in Botany at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, unlocked the mystery. In his opinion, the special smell of toon buds does not come from a single compound, but from the combination of substances that stimulate the nasal mucosa. These substances include terpenes, sesquiterpenes, caryophyllene, syringene and other volatile substances. Caryophyllene, in particular, gives off a blend of aromas similar to citrus, camphor and cloves.
In addition, toon buds are rich in glutamic acid. When tasting scrambled eggs with toon sprouts, the glutamic acid in the toon sprouts plus the nucleotides in the eggs will have a taste gain effect and make the dish taste more beautiful.
Toon buds are delicious, but attention should be paid to the processing method. Experts remind that when eating toon buds, do not eat directly, you should first blanch it with boiling water to remove the nitrite contained in it, which is a strong carcinogen. It's easy: add water to a pot, heat to a boil, add fresh toon buds that you've just picked, and blanch for a minute. Whether it is pickled toon buds, scrambled eggs with toon buds, and toon buds mixed with tofu, it must be blanched with boiling water beforehand.
Toon buds, known as vegetables that grow on trees, have a delicious taste and are loved by the Chinese people. The mainland is currently the only country in the world that uses toon buds as vegetables.
Toon is native to the central and southern parts of the continent. Now, except for the cold northern and western regions, toon is almost all over the country, especially in Shandong, Hebei and Henan.
As mentioned above, the eve of the valley rain is the best time to pick and eat toon buds. As the saying goes: "Before the rain Tsubaki buds are tender, after the rain Tsubaki buds grow wood bodies". Because on the eve of the valley rain, the toon buds are tender and mellow and refreshing, and the nutritional value is high. If the harvest is late, the leaves gradually age, the leaf stems are lignified, and even if they are fried, they cannot be chewed and are difficult to swallow.
03
Toon is cultivated in greenhouses
It can be listed on New Year's Day
With the advancement of science and technology, after the cultivation of protected land, the earliest toon buds were listed around New Year's Day, and there was no need to wait for the valley rain to come. A few years ago, a reporter from the mass newspaper industry and a rural mass reporter went to Wudi County to interview and saw the toon trees planted in the greenhouse. Unfortunately, it was not the right time to go, it was a hot summer, and I did not eat the newly picked toon buds.
In recent years, in Sitou Town, Linqu County, located in the Yimeng Mountains, a village called Nanxi'an has become famous, and the red toon buds produced are famous far and wide. In addition to the more than 600 acres of toon trees growing in the open on the mountain ridge, the village has also built 100 greenhouses and planted toon trees. Liu Jun, secretary of the party branch of the village, introduced the tips of planting and managing the local greenhouse toon.
Toon planted in a greenhouse in Nanxi'an Village, Sitou Town, Linqu County.
The greenhouse is supported by a steel frame, the upper part is circular, and the toon trees are densely planted in the shed, reaching about 80 trees per square meter. After about 40 to 45 days (around New Year's Day), when the toon buds grow to 16 cm to 18 cm long, the head stubble is picked. After that, two or three stubbles are picked, and when the open-air cultivated head stubble toon is on the market during the Qingming Festival, the picking of the toon buds in the greenhouse ends here. There are two reasons: on the one hand, the price of toon buds has dropped significantly, and on the other hand, the tree body has aged.
Toon has a strong ability to germinate, and when the young shoots are picked, they sprout new shoots, but this is a great nutrient consumption for a toon tree. After three or four stubble pickings, the toon tree looks like a dying old man, it seems that the lamp has run out of oil, and it is difficult to grow healthily after that. As a result, local growers cut it out, discarded it, and relocated young trees from the open mountain range to find vigorous young trees.
As for the toon trees that grow in the open air, they are not ignored and allowed to grow naturally. Liu Jun said that the first stubble of toon buds is generally picked in early April, and the third stubble is picked around May 20. Then cut dry, that is, saw off the trunk from 20 cm above the ground, discard the upper part. Within a few days, a number of young shoots sprouted from its underground roots, drilled out of the ground, and gradually grew into a number of young trees. The main reason for this is to control the height of its tree. Toon trees generally grow about 150 cm tall every year, if they are allowed to grow wildly and the branches are too high, it will cause inconvenience to picking toon buds later.
04
Toon and Ailanthus
Discernment is skillful
Among the common trees, there is a kind of tree with the word "Tsubaki", in addition to toon, there is also a kind of ailanthus called Ailanthus. Both look similar, both have pinnate compound leaves, and many people can't tell which is the toon and which is the ailanthus.
Taxonomically speaking, the two are not a family, toon belongs to the neem family, and Ailanthus belongs to the bitter wood family. The actual types of results are also different, including toon fruit and ailanthus fruit.
Toon (left) bears fruit, Ailanthus bears wing fruit. (Image from "Identification of Plants")
This is still difficult to distinguish for those who have not studied plant taxonomy.
There are three simple ways to distinguish between them:
A sniff of the smell. The leaves of the toon emit a faint fragrance, while the leaves of the ailanthus emit a very special and unpleasant smell.
Two look at the bark. The bark of the toon has a strip-like crack, and the bark of the Ailanthus tree also has a crack, but it is not a strip-like crack.
Three-digit compound leaf. The leaves of both toon and Ailanthus are pinnate compound leaves, the difference being that the former is usually an even pinnate compound leaf, while the latter is mostly an odd pinnate compound leaf.
The even pinnate compound leaves of toon (left) are compared to the odd pinnate compound leaves of Ailanthus. (Image from Concise Biology Dictionary)
Chen Jianzhi, a rural public reporter of the mass newspaper industry
For a review of past issues, click to read:
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Agricultural Science Window (6) | hybrid potatoes are coming out! Uncover the story of innovation behind it
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