#我来唠家常#
Raw pickles in the mouth of Chaoshan
It's a poison that you can't quit after eating it once
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In spring, the temperature rises, and the Chaoshan food stalls at night appear more noisy. The colorful fish rice makes it difficult for patients with difficulty in choosing, and the fragrant white millet irons the impatience again. In front of the cutting board, the men take up and drop their knives, and the raw pickled pike crab, or jié (triocular crab) as it is known in the local population, is opened and cut into pieces for paste, and the raw pickled shrimp cricket is trimmed with head and tail trimmed and evenly cut into sections.
▲ Raw pickled crab cuts. Photo/"Flavor Origin"
A plate is roughly arranged and served with a raw pickle of chili vinegar, the meat is white and red, and it looks like it is not cooked, but it has never been cooked at all. Why can this Chaoshan "poison" overshadow abalone and sea cucumbers? And how can Chaoshan's wanderers worry about their stomachs?
▲ Colding pays more attention to the plating of raw pickled crabs. Photo/"Flavor Origin"
See what pickles what
The traditional raw pickling of shrimp and crab in Chaoshan is the main one, and the seasoning of sea salt, soy sauce, garlic, chili pepper and coriander is added to soak in the flavor, and the time ranges from half a day to one day. The saltiness of the salt makes the plump seafood more substantial, and the short marinating also maintains the elastic taste of the seafood. Unlike seafood, river fresh foods such as crabs, cockroaches and clams can also be pickled, but they need to be heavier and soaked longer to ensure that the bacteria and parasites are killed before they can be eaten. In any case, the purpose of Chaoshan pickled is to satisfy people's pursuit of authenticity.
▲ Raw pickles in the supper stall. Photo/Lian Youxi
The custom of eating shrimp and crab raw was more prosperous in ancient times, and it was recorded in the "Tokyo Menghualu" of the Song Dynasty. There is a "hand-washed crab" in the book, where the live crab is chopped into pieces and drizzled with ingredients, so that guests can taste it after washing their hands, and you may be able to see the fresh crab meat twitching when you put it in your mouth.
▲ Raw pickled shrimp. Photo/Lian Youxi
Give the Chaoshan people a handful of salt, and they can pickle the whole world. Here, there is almost no surprise, only no food. Abalone, lobster, shrimp, crickets, blue crabs, blood clams, oysters, and even crickets with thin shells, a handful of salt teaches them to "be human again" in minutes. There are Chaoshan friends, even celery is pickled raw - celery is cut into sections, added to fish sauce and minced garlic and soaked for half a day to eat.
▲ Celery can also be treated as raw pickles, and there are no regrets in this life. Photo/Lian Youxi
The traditional Chaoshan pickled pickle also has the momentum to make its way into the internet celebrity. For example, Zhang Xinmin, president of the Chaozhou Cuisine Research Association and a gourmet, has a "ultrasonic raw pickled crab" - select the fattest cream crab in the season, soak it in salt water to kill, then wash and sterilize it with an ultrasonic instrument, add traditional spices and brandy, season and marinate for more than 24 hours, and finally take it out and drain it and freeze it in a vacuum. The frozen raw pickled crab meat is as cold and dense as ice cream, and the crab paste and crab roe are like flowing semi-cooked cheese, which is satisfying.
▲ Zhang Xinmin made hairy crabs by raw pickling and freezing. Photo/"Flavor Origin"
It is said that the first to make frozen raw pickles was a Songfa food stall in Chenghai District, Shantou City. Chenghai people said: "Loose hair salty crab falls with five spices, and it is fragrant and sweet to eat." Back then, the loose-haired raw pickled winter sherb (jié) was very popular and sold all year round. The secret is to pickle the winter bessels in the winter and seal them in cold storage for freezing.
Is dry curing a dry marinade?
It is said that Wen eats Shantou, and Wu eats Shanwei. Chaoshan's raw pickles put a lot of ingredients, but Shanwei's raw pickles maintain the original roughness - only a lot of coarse salt is used to wrap the seafood in the marinade, and when you taste it, you will not dip it in chili vinegar, so that the saltiness and fishiness will run rampant in the mouth. This is known as "dry pickling" by the outside world.
▲ Dry-pickled scallops, the rough sea salt is clearly visible. Photo/Lian Youxi
In the current Shanwei fish market, you can still see such salty sellers of dry-pickled seafood. Salted crabs, salted clams, salted shrimp, salted shrimp crickets, respectively, are put in a basin and opened, in the snow-white coarse salt, the figure of shrimp and crab is looming, green shell red paste, salty and fishy. The people of Shanwei choose dry-pickled seafood and pay attention to two words: the ship.
▲ Shanwei Port, near the sea. Photo/Visual China
On the boat, it means that the shrimp and crabs are salted on the boat immediately after they are caught. As far as the dry pickling of ships is concerned, the tricorn crab (pike crab) is the most delicious, especially the dry pickled crab of ocean-going vessels. The white flesh and red paste of the shellfish became glutinous and fragrant on the way back, and even had an infuriating sticky tooth taste. Lu Feng has a food stall called Sister Restaurant, and the "prince" of this house makes his own dry-pickled winter shellfish every year, according to him, a big tong is enough for him to eat for a day.
▲ Pickled trimulans. Photo/Lian Youxi
Among the older generation of Shanwei people, they also like a small shell called a dog cockle. Cockles are only the size of a fingernail, and most of them are pickled in large urns, and a handful of cockles and a handful of coarse salt are layered on top of each other, and it is said that they can be stored for many years without deteriorating. The dry-pickled cockles are full and juicy, and are called "nine items" by the people of Shanwei, which means that a salted dog cockle is worth nine delicacies. This is also the proof that "one big tong is enough to eat for a day".
▲ Dry-pickled dog cockles. Photo/Lian Youxi
Influenced by Chaoshan raw pickles, in recent years, Shanwei's dry pickled salted goods have also improved. Some people simply drizzle the marinated shrimp and crab with soy sauce and garlic chili, while others combine the two methods into one, first dry marinating with a small amount of coarse salt, and then marinating raw in light soy sauce. The people of Shanwei also opened up the "frontier" of dry pickling, turning the small seafood on the reef - barnacles, shells, and turtle feet into new objects of dry pickling. However, that pure salty fragrance is still the most touching taste of Shanwei people.
▲ Turtle feet, also known as dog claw snails. Photo/Lian Youxi
Pickled into puree, marinated into sauce
If you can't even accept the raw pickling of "light pickling for half a day", then the Chaoshan 醢 (hǎi) pickled for months will subvert your three views. The original meaning of 醢 is meat sauce, and in ancient times, there was a kind of criminal law against criminals also called 醢 (self-brain supplement). The local Chaoshan sauce represents the ultimate raw pickling – the seafood is marinated until the protein ferments and the meat becomes a paste. For example, shrimp squid, sea urchin, shrimp cricket, money snail, your arsenic, my honey.
▲ Qian Luo. Photo/Lian Youxi
I remember that my grandmother used to treasure a bottle of sea urchin 醢 (hǎi). The fattest sea urchin in spring is made by salting it in the sea for more than a month. Sea urchins themselves have a special fishy freshness, and after pickling and fermentation, it is even more unacceptable. But my grandmother still sandwiched a basket of sea urchin sauce every day and ate two bowls of white porridge beautifully.
▲ Shelled shrimp crickets. Photo/Lian Youxi
Compared with the high-level sea urchin squid, the squid squid is much more accessible to the people. Although many Chaoshan people like to eat it raw, I prefer to use it in my dishes – the squid is washed and chopped, topped with minced pork belly, minced garlic, eggs and potato flour, steamed or fried, and is pleasantly aromatic, especially for congee with wine. When stir-frying water spinach (we call it tongcai) and eggplant, add two or three squid dumplings, and the level of the dish is immediately much higher.
▲ Squid squid. Photo/Lian Youxi
In spring, the temperature rises, and the Chaoshan supper stalls at night appear more noisy. If you want to come to Chaoshan at this time, I suggest you eat more shrimp crickets (peel shrimp) and shellfish pickled, which is fatty and delicious, and it is suitable for the time and the occasion.