【Culture Yongchang】Sun Zhiming | Prose: There is no hatred in eating Yongchang mutton

When I arrived in Yongchang, I didn't climb Wudang Mountain, which means I didn't come. When I arrived in Yongchang, I didn't eat Yongchang's Beishan goat meat, which is equivalent to coming in vain.

The mutton of Yongchang Beishan and the mutton of the south, especially the mutton of Shuangfeng Town, Taicang, Jiangsu, are two ways to eat, each with its own strengths.

The mutton of Taicang Shuangfeng is goat meat, such as the fine of the southerners, it is a delicate practice, and it tastes exquisite and elegant, mainly white-cut mutton and mutton noodles, braised mutton with skin, and the processing method is full of tricks, and the seasoning is mainly white pepper.

The mutton of Yongchang Beishan, simple to make, bold to eat, is Beishan sheep, boiled and yellow stewed common, the seasoning is mainly ginger, the mutton soup pinches a pinch of fresh garlic seedlings, green onions, one white, two green and three clear, it seems that it does not bubble hot, and a sip can burn off the skin on the tongue.

Around the suburbs of Yongchang County, there are many farmhouse-style mutton restaurants. On holidays, weekends, especially in summer and autumn, the mutton restaurant is full of vehicles parked around, and the license plates of vehicles are available all over the country. There is a kind of steaming noise in the air, which is set against the quiet and deep Beihaizi Park in the north of the city not far away, the modern and fashionable Shazaolin RV Camping Base, and the boiling Beihaizi National Wetland Park.

If you haven't been to Yongchang, think about it, isn't it very interesting: I came for the majestic landscape, I was full of eyes and happy hearts, but I could still eat to my heart's content. Just as I wanted to see the snow on the top of the South Mountain, but I was fascinated by the reeds in the wetlands; I wanted to camp, but I smelled the fragrance of sand date flowers - perhaps, the interest of life is like this, not in setting a goal to go to a road, but in the unexpected gains on the way.

After enjoying the scenery, bathing in the fragrance of birds and flowers, the eyes are full, the belly is noisy, wandering to the mutton restaurant on the outskirts of the city, the door is open to you, no one at the door greets and solicits, you can enter whichever house. Go in, and someone will greet you. After a few sips of tea, a steaming plate of boiled lamb came up. Why is it called Big Boil? It's a large piece of lamb cooked in a large pot. To what extent, the length of the mutton piece is as long as a twelve-inch platter, and you have to hold it firmly with both hands to eat, so that you can eat as much as you want, and you will sweat profusely and enjoy it. The mutton is tender and rotten, not fatty, not greasy, not fishy, and the taste is excellent, so that you can't help but feel that although you are in a foreign land, a warm mood swells in your heart, and even the stomach and intestines are ironed up from afar, and your relatives and friends or confidants, while eating and tasting, even in the cold winter, it will be a lot less cold.

If you want to taste another way to taste mutton, there are also yellow stew, mutton mat rolls, dumplings, boiling pot shabu, mutton noodles, offal, fried sheep's head, spicy sheep's trotters, roasted whole lamb...... As long as you want to eat, although you eat, but no matter how you eat, you can eat meat, drink wine, in the laughter, smiles, let you and Yongchang blend with each other, no longer feel that this world is cold, but a kind of passionate noise and indescribable drunken satisfaction, but can make you eat a heroic heroic spirit.

When you are full of eyes and mouths, you will be able to realize that the mountains and rivers of Yongchang are not only beautiful and gentle, but "dynamic and static", and the charm of "deliciousness" of mutton can impress you.

Because Yongchang is ancient, as an important post station on the ancient Silk Road, as the subtle influence of the Han culture and the ancient Xiongnu and other Western cultures, Yongchang will naturally inherit more of the charm of the Yellow River culture, forming its own unique aesthetic vision and cultural atmosphere; The ice and snow of Qilian Mountain have created the unique mysterious peace, solemnity and solemnity of the land of Yongchang, and it is this cultural atmosphere, mysterious peace, solemnity and solemnity, which has given birth to the outstanding boldness and expansiveness of Yongchang people, the ancient style and blood of freedom and uninhibitedness, as well as the contemporary crisis, righteousness and bravery, and the unyielding style of the ancestors embodied in Yongchang culture, as well as the personality form of generosity, tolerance, grandeur and atmosphere.

Eating Yongchang North goat meat, for southerners, may be patient, slowly and carefully bite and suck. But since it's meat, you can't eat a full mouth, and you always have the intention of hating it.

The ancients have long discussed the hatred of the food industry, what puffer fish is poisonous, anchovy has bones, kumquat is sour, etc., and anyone with special delicacy has a kind of hatred. Northerners, especially northwesterners, like to eat meat in large pieces and drink wine in large bowls, which is related to the vast wilderness and land, reflecting the extensive heroism and refreshing and smooth. Southerners like to eat bits and pieces of food, chicken wings and duck paws in Guangdong restaurants, fish head and pigbones in Zhejiang shops, nearly 100 kinds of mutton flavors in Jiangsu mutton hall shops, all chicken and dog pieces, peeled and eaten for a long time without eating anything, but there are also many people who have a good bite, fingers peel a trace, chopsticks poke twice, suck the mouth three times, the tip of the tongue shrinks a few times, and enjoy it.

In fact, many delicacies are in the tedious process of peeling and gnawing. But the northerners omitted the tedious process and went straight to the point. For example, if you eat watermelon, you can pick it up and eat it after a few knives, because the taste of watermelon, flick it with your fingers when you don't cut it, and the echo of Bu Bu is full of cracks has made people can't wait, and when you cut it, you will make a crisp sound of a knife into an inch and a crack of three inches, and then spray out a sweet fragrance that is refreshing and refreshing, and then the bright red, thick yellow melon is full of greed, and the bite is crispy white meat, and the edge of the tooth marks is deep in the kiss, which is the complete taste.

Delicious and hateful, and eat melon seeds, but also hate the shell big and benevolent, so someone used the machine to peel the melon seed shell, one package after another, in response to the saying "melon seeds on the grinding platform, live out of the benevolence (people) come". There is a little song "Gift Melon Seeds", the strong affection and honey of "although the melon seeds are small and do not need to be many, all of them have been on the tip of my tongue" disappeared when chewing a lot of melon seeds. One by one, it is reflected. The same is true for pine seed kernels, if you don't eat the kernels, the root of the tongue will be black and bitter for several days.

To chew the sugar cane, you have to peel the skin first with the clatter of the gums; To eat crabs, you have to use both fingertips and tongues; To nibble and tear the boiled mutton in Yongchang Beishan, you have to move your fingers, teeth and chopsticks, or hold the bones and gnaw a full mouth, take the time to take another sip of wine, and let the time pass unconsciously, so that you can have taste and no hatred. Compared with the taste of sucking the pulp and removing the meat in the cracks of the bones, tearing and biting carefully, and spitting the slag and peeling the shell, cramping and sucking the juice, eating Yongchang North goat meat will never be delicious and hateful together.

If you want to take only the essence, you may end up with dross.

About author:Sun Zhiming, a native of Yongchang County, Gansu Province, now lives in Jinchang, a member of the Gansu Writers Association, a member of the Chinese Writers Website, and a signed writer of "Ancient Legends". The essay "Gobi Town" was selected into the "Reader" humanities reading series and won the first Jinchang Literature and Art Award, the novel "The Return of the Hunter" won the first prize of the "Legend of the Ancients" National Novel Competition, and some of the essays won some national literary competition awards.