#中国地道风物 #
Is the tribute dish lettuce (lettuce)? This question has been debated for a long time!
Those who say "yes" say that the plant used to process tribute vegetables is very similar in form to the plant form of lettuce (lettuce), except that the stem is "thin" and "tall".
People who say "no" say: the form of the tribute vegetable plant is quite different from that of lettuce (lettuce), the stem is "thinner" and more "taller", and the taste is better than lettuce (lettuce) and more crispy to eat.
So is the tribute dish lettuce (lettuce)? The answer is yes, the plant used to process tribute vegetables is lettuce.
Lettuce is harvested and processed into tribute vegetables
Believing those friends who say "no" and seeing me "is" is bound to argue.
No hurry!
There is also something that will make some friends "anxious".
Not only is the tribute dish lettuce, but lettuce and oil wheat are lettuce.
Don't be surprised!
And he's heard me come all together.
Dry the tribute
Let's talk about lettuce first?
Lactuca Sative is a one- or two-year herbaceous and highly variable plant of the genus Asteraceae lettuce, native to the Mediterranean region, and historically proven, the Egyptians first cultivated lettuce.
Over time, lettuce has spread around the world and is now one of the world's most important vegetables.
During the process of transmission and cultivation, the species lettuce has undergone large variations.
According to the difference of the main edible part of lettuce, we can divide it into two types, leaf lettuce and stem lettuce, the plant characteristics of these two types of lettuce are quite different, and the different varieties in the two types also have great differences.
How big is the difference?
Wild lettuce
Cultivated varieties as large as many lettuces, if you rely only on visual senses, you will not believe that they are the same species in botany.
The lettuce, gongcai (the plant that processes it), lettuce, and oil wheat mentioned above are actually cultivated varieties that have appeared in the long process of domestication, spread and cultivation of lettuce.
In other words, they are botanically or essentially lettuce species.
As a plant and vegetable, the "story" of lettuce is wonderful, so although the point of view has been expressed, the understanding of lettuce should not stop here, let's continue.
Lettuce (lettuce) seeds
The first lettuce was used to extract oil and subsequently cultivated as leafy vegetables
Lettuce is an imported vegetable on the mainland, and there is now a variety of evidence that the Egyptians first domesticated lettuce, but the first lettuce was not used for leaves or stems, but for oil.
The Egyptians pressed lettuce seeds for oil consumption, and at first lettuce was not cultivated as a vegetable, which may be related to the early domesticated lettuce containing a large amount of lettuce (a hemiterpene lipid compound), which has a bitter taste, the more content the bitter taste, so the earliest human cultivation of lettuce is not suitable for consumption.
However, the Egyptians used lettuce, which was said to have calming and sleeping properties at the time.
Lettuce flowers
In fact, many current lettuce cultivars also contain lettuce, and some varieties also have a bitter taste if tasted carefully, but the content is much less than wild lettuce.
Careful friends may find that white juice will flow out when breaking fresh lettuce in the field, which contains lettuce, and the current lettuce of raw leaves, such as lettuce, has a very low content of lettuce in its leaves.
In the ensuing period, lettuce cultivated in Egypt began to spread rapidly throughout the Mediterranean, and slowly domesticated leafy vegetable varieties during the Roman Empire.
However, early human-cultivated leaf lettuce varieties were sparser than current leaf lettuces and still had a certain bitter taste.
After the birth of leafy vegetable lettuce, it began to spread to a wider area, and began its mutation journey.
Lettuce (lettuce)
Stem-eating lettuce and oil wheat originated in the north of the mainland, and the tribute vegetable is lettuce
The time when lettuce was introduced to the mainland is still debated, one is that it was introduced in the Han Dynasty, the other is that it was introduced in the Sui Dynasty, and most people in the industry prefer that lettuce was introduced to the mainland during the Sui Dynasty.
It is recorded in the "Qing Yilu" of the Song Dynasty
When the envoy of the country came to Han, the Sui people asked for vegetable seeds, and the reward was very rich, so it was called a thousand golden vegetables, and now lettuce is also.
It can be seen that as late as the 6th century AD, there was already lettuce on the mainland, but the lettuce introduced to the mainland in the early days was not the lettuce cultivated on a large scale on the continent, but leafy vegetables with a bitter taste.
Oily wheat
Lettuce introduced to the mainland was continuously cultivated and domesticated, and by the Song Dynasty, there were lettuce with more leaves and lettuce with swollen stems. (Lettuce shoots in Tokyo Yumehualu have become seasonal vegetables in Kaifeng in June; Although oil wheat vegetables were also available during the Song Dynasty, it can be seen from ancient texts and poems that the bitterness is heavier than the current oil wheat vegetables, and there were records of raw food in the Yuan Dynasty)
It is easy to understand the appearance of the lettuce variety of oil wheat in the mainland, after all, it is still leaf lettuce.
Why do stem lettuces appear with large morphological differences? I think there are two factors.
- First, lettuce was first planted in the northern region after it was introduced to the mainland, and the climate of the northern region of the mainland and the origin of lettuce are quite different, the temperature is much lower and the temperature difference between day and night is large, which is a condition conducive to the expansion of lettuce stems.
- Second, the ancient farmers of the mainland took the initiative to choose lettuce varieties with swollen stems, and the reason why they deliberately chose lettuce for stems, first of all, the variety of leafy vegetables in the mainland at that time was already relatively rich and not bitter; Secondly, because the storage tolerance of plant stems is higher than that of leaves, eating stems in ancient times was certainly more beneficial to ancient people than eating leaves.
Stems with lettuce and tribute vegetables
Let's talk a little more about "tribute vegetables", strictly speaking, tribute vegetables are a processed vegetable or peeled dehydrated vegetable, and this vegetable is lettuce (lettuce).
I mentioned earlier that lettuce is a highly variable vegetable, and according to Tokyo Menghualu, lettuce has been cultivated on the mainland for at least 900 years.
During these 900 years, many cultivars of lettuce appeared, divided into pointed leaves and round leaves according to leaves; According to the stem, it is divided into coarse and thin stems, tall stems and short stems; According to the taste, it is divided into crunchy and not so crunchy.
The vegetable used to process tribute vegetables is a kind of lettuce variety with sharp leaves, thin stems, and crunchy stems, of course, coarse stem lettuce can also be processed into tribute vegetables, but the taste is different.
All in all, what kind of plant is a tribute dish should be determined by plant taxonomy, and cannot be seen and eaten.
Various leaf lettuce
Lettuce was introduced to Europe and the United States, giving birth to abundant leaf lettuce resources
Native to the mainland, leaf lettuce is only one kind of oil wheat, and a variety of "lettuce" are born in Europe and the United States.
Lettuce was introduced to Europe earlier, and in the 16th-17th centuries Europe appeared the curly leaf lettuce we currently eat, which belongs to knotted lettuce according to the leaf shape; At the same time, wrinkled leaf lettuce and colored lettuce appeared, which belonged to wrinkled leaf lettuce according to leaf shape; At present, "romaine lettuce" has appeared in Italy, which belongs to upright lettuce according to the leaf shape, and our oil wheat is also upright lettuce.
Subsequently, a variety of "lettuce" was brought to the American continent, and many varieties were formed in the Americas.
Then, a variety of lettuce began to spread to the world, with the support of modern breeding technology, there are more types of "lettuce", and lettuce currently native to the mainland has also been introduced and planted in other countries.
At the end of the article, I give you a loose suggestion, if you see a dish like "lettuce" but not your common "lettuce", then you say it is lettuce, others want to refute you, you talk to him about botany, lettuce this family.
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