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Delicious wisteria flowers
Jiangxi Jiujiang City/Jiang Chuxin
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I'm so familiar with wisteria flowers. In our mountainous area of southern Anhui, the forest is luxuriant, the vegetation is abundant, and the scenery is pleasant. When spring comes, all kinds of flowers bloom in the mountains, red azaleas, white sandalwood flowers, wild cherry blossoms, peach blossoms, and pink mountain peach blossoms...... Dress up the mountains and fields in a colorful way. And the wisteria flowers also quietly bloomed before and after the Qingming Festival, a bush here, a cluster there, lilac flowers all over the mountains, the spring scenery of the mountain village is dressed up brilliantly and colorful.
Wisteria is a vine plant that generally clings to shrubs. When early spring comes, young shoots emerge from the original bare vines, and after a while, the branches and leaves grow like palms, and the whole bush of wisteria becomes impermeable. Before and after Qingming, strings of flower bones grew under the armpits of the leaves, as if they were about to struggle to break the fetters of the branches and leaves, panting, desperately pushing away the dense branches and leaves with their hands, and trying their best to look outside. It didn't take long for a few wisteria flowers to bloom quietly under the dense young leaves, followed by other purple flowers. Clusters of lilac flowers sway among the green leaves, like strings of beautiful wind chimes. In this way, the wisteria flowers are clustered and layered, exuding a faint fragrance in the warm spring breeze. The lilac wisteria flowers seem to be frozen in the spring light from a distance, beautiful and warm, like a page of exquisite illustrations in a fairy tale.
The first time I knew that wisteria flowers could be eaten was when I was seven or eight years old. That day, my grandmother held a penny in her hand and called me to go with me to pick wisteria flowers. When I came to the bamboo dock in the mountain behind the village, my grandmother twisted her feet and climbed the winding mountain road tremblingly, leading me to the foot of the mountain. The wisteria flowers in the dense forest are blooming like purple waterfalls. I saw my grandmother stretch the penny into the flower vine, and after seeing a bunch of flower vines, the penny in her hand twisted hard, and the purple flower spike fell in response. And I stood under the vines, and when I saw the spikes of flowers falling from the branches, I caught them with both hands so that they would not fall into the mud.
When you get home, you can pick up the flowers, clean them, chop them into minced pieces with a knife, mix them with rice noodles, and put them in a pot until they are golden brown on both sides. Standing on the stove, I stood on tiptoe and heard the "squeak" sound in the pot, and then the sweet smell got into my nose and made me salivate immediately. It's the first time I've eaten wisteria like this, and I'm really looking forward to it. After the cake was baked, he didn't care about the hot mouth, and when he opened his mouth, he took a bite, and before he could taste it well, he slipped down and ate a few in a row. At that time, I felt that the pancakes made of wisteria flowers were different, and after a while of gobbling up, the teeth and cheeks were fragrant, and the aftertaste was long.
Steamed vegetables are a special dish in southern Anhui, and meat and vegetables can be steamed, preserving the original taste of the food. Houttuynia cordata and tea vine can be steamed and eaten, and wisteria flowers can also be steamed. After the wisteria flowers are taken down, they are cleaned, drained and mixed into the rice noodles, salt, monosodium glutamate and other seasonings are added and stirred evenly, and then they can be steamed on high heat on the rice retort, and they can be out of the pot after more than 20 minutes. If you want to say that this steamed dish is delicious, the secret lies in this rice noodle. The powder used to steam vegetables is indica rice flour, grind the rice into powder, and it is not too fine, and it is better to have a grit feeling in your hand. Indica rice flour is moderately viscous, and the rice flour is also mixed with sun-dried minced perilla and minced fragrant soybean, which makes the rice noodles taste particularly delicious. The wisteria flowers are steamed at high temperatures, and the rice noodles penetrate each other, and they are completely fused with the rice noodles. Take advantage of the steam to stir evenly with a spoon, put it into a bowl, and then use chopsticks to pick up a lump and send it into your mouth, without chewing too much, the tip of your tongue is gently sipped, and the steamed wisteria flowers in your mouth will melt, soft and smooth, and your mouth is filled with a faint fragrance, which makes people can't help but eat it.
Later, when I read a book, I saw that the ancients also ate wisteria flowers. Gao Lian of the Ming Dynasty mentioned the eating method of vine flowers in "Zunsheng Eight Notes, Drinking and Serving Food": picking flowers and washing them, sprinkling salt soup and mixing well, steaming them in a bottle, drying them, and making them stuffing, which is very beautiful. It is also best used for meat. At the end of the Qing Dynasty, Fucha Dunchong's "Yanjing Years Chronicles" contained: "In March, the money is picked and steamed at the beginning of the elm period, and it is combined with sugar noodles, which is called the elm money cake." Those who take the vine flower as it are called the vine cake of the vine carrot. All the food is in season. Li Bai, a great poet of the Tang Dynasty, had a soft spot for wisteria flowers, and when he saw the spikes of wisteria flowers hanging low and blooming like a waterfall, he couldn't help but write this poem "Wisteria Tree": "Wisteria hangs on cloud trees, and flowers and vines are suitable for spring." Dense leaves hidden singing birds, fragrant wind to stay beautiful. "It's a reverie to read, and it's exciting.
Wisteria flowers can be refined into aromatic oils, and have detoxification, antiemetic and diarrheal effects. Wisteria seeds are slightly poisonous and contain cyanide, which can cure muscle and bone pain and prevent wine from spoiling. Wisteria bark has the effects of insecticide, pain relief, wind dispelling and channeling, and can be used to treat musculoskeletal pain, wind paralysis pain, pinworm disease, etc.
(Editor's note: In many regions, there is a custom of picking wisteria flowers, and the common ways to eat them are steamed or made into porridge, cakes, pastries, etc.) However, the pods, seeds, and stem bark of wisteria are poisonous, and eating too many wisteria flowers can also cause nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps, and diarrhea. Readers need to be cautious when consuming it. ）
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The author of this article is Jiang Chuxin
Editor of this article: Hidetaki