No chicken can leave Guangdong alive, and they will be left behind by the industrious and wise people of Guangdong in hundreds of ways.
According to relevant statistics in 2016, in Guangzhou alone, the annual consumption of broiler chickens is 100 million. On average, guangzhou ate at least 7 chickens per person per year that year. If the statistical scope is expanded to the whole country, the number of chickens eaten per capita per year is 3.
In Guangdong, chickens have a class
According to statistics from 2016, Guangzhou consumes 100 million broiler chickens per year. On average, guangzhou ate at least 7 chickens per person per year that year. If the statistical scope is expanded to the whole country, the number of chickens eaten per capita per year is 3.
In Guangdong, chickens are divided into raw chickens (boy roosters), xiang chickens (small hens that will lay eggs), fan chickens (castrated chickens), and chicken cocks (aged roosters and hens), and then made into white cut chickens, chicken pots and chicken soup, respectively; they are also divided into layer chickens, broiler chickens, egg and meat dual-purpose chickens, and food and medicine chickens.
In Guangdong, chickens have a class. According to the custom of the Hong Kong chicken pen, the chicken is divided into upper chicken, middle chicken and lower chicken. The difference between the three is not in the age of the chicken, but in the quality. A chicken must meet the standard of "fat, tender, smooth and not hard bone". The chicken must be fat, but it will be discounted on the tenderness and crispness of the chicken bones. Some of the chickens are because of congenital deficiencies, and some are because they do not work hard the day after tomorrow and cannot meet the best standards.
A good chicken produced locally should have the following physical characteristics: young and smooth hair, jute color, short neck, thin eyes, short wings, short and thin feet, golden yellow feet, small crown, large and drooping tail, and particularly full chest and tail.
There are 8 excellent chicken breeds in Guangdong, of which Qingyuan ma chicken is the most popular. This chicken originated from the Lingnan wild original chicken, is currently the only chicken breed that maintains the shape and meat flavor characteristics of the wild raw chicken, and is closest to the Guangdong wild raw chicken.
Corresponding to the Qingyuan Ma Chicken, at the bottom of the chain of contempt, is the white feather chicken that Lao Guang sneers at. From the yellow-feathered chicken to the white-feathered chicken, it is a cliff-like decline, which can be called a qualitative plunge.
White feather chickens also have their own advantages: high yield, soft meat, short growth cycle, and cheap. As early as 1981, the Guangdong Food Company introduced the American AA broiler chicken, the most famous commercial broiler chicken at that time. When it was first introduced, everyone thought that this could increase the supply of chicken meat in the province, reduce meat prices, improve people's dietary structure, and promote the development of chicken raising... However, the people of Guangdong would rather not eat chicken than eat white feather chicken with poor taste and lack of taste, and the introduced white feather chicken was once unsalable.
The data shows that the self-sufficiency rate of chicken in Guangdong Province is about 77%, which means that the excellent local breed of chickens cannot meet the chicken needs of all Guangdong people. As a result, Guangdong people will occasionally eat chicken transferred from other provinces, but not all foreign chickens can enter the eyes of Guangdong people, only Wenchang chicken from Hainan and three yellow chickens from Guangxi can still be eaten.
In Guangdong, every chicken is treated solemnly
Most of the various chicken recipes that Chinese are familiar with are also from Guangdong.
According to Chen Mengyin's record in the Food Classic, there are no less than 30 kinds of Cantonese cuisine with whole chicken as the main ingredient. If you add cooking with chicken parts as the main ingredient, this number will be doubled again.
Some practices are still used today, such as white cut chicken, salt baked chicken, scallion oil chicken, soy sauce chicken. There are also some chicken dishes, which are difficult to find on the market for various reasons. For example, "oil-soaked chicken", according to legend, even the best white cut chicken in the fire does not taste as good as "oil-soaked chicken".
To make oil-soaked chicken, first of all, choose a chicken that is fat and tender enough, wash and wipe dry and blow the drum, and then boil thirteen or two raw oils, remove the stove head and add three or two raw oils, mix well, put into the chicken, cover the pot and soak for 15 minutes, take out, dry, chop the pieces, and eat.
Some of the methods that have been used to this day are different from those that they once were. Take the salt-baked chicken, for example. In the Food Classic, Chen Mengyin lists several different recipes for baking chicken with salt. The oldest method is to wrap the whole chicken in white sand paper and bake it in hot salt. The "Hakka salt baked chicken", from the point of view of the method, is closer to the "five-spice oil salt chicken": the whole steamed chicken is placed in frozen lard with five-spiced salt while it is hot, soaked for several minutes, and then removes the cut pieces after the chicken is full of five-spice salt and lard.
The salt baked chicken is made in a unique way, the whole chicken is salted and baked with coarse salt. Graph / Network
In this way, Bai Che seems to be the oldest and most orthodox practice about chickens.
In the culinary logic of Cantonese cuisine, all the best ingredients deserve to be treated in the most simple way. The best way to treat a Qingyuan ma chicken with red roots is to cut it white. The process is simple, the finished product is simple.
First of all, the chicken should be good, pure in blood, and tender enough. The method is much the same, but "three dips and three mentions" is a must: turn off the heat after the water is boiled, carry the chicken head into the pot and dip the chicken skin into the shape, and then pass the cold water. After repeating this three times, immerse the whole chicken in the pan for another 30 minutes. After soaking, wipe the chicken dry or let it dry.
The last addition to the white cut chicken is the preparation of the dipping sauce. Crush the ginger and squeeze the water dry, then cut a little chopped green onion and mix it together, add salt and a little sesame oil to taste, and finally sprinkle with piping hot peanut oil.
The dipping sauce used in the white cut chicken not only has a special aroma, but also obtains unexpected flavors, making the white cut chicken feel more fragrant. Graph / Network
At CNKI, there is also an academic paper that explores the influence of different breeds of chickens on the quality of white cut chickens. Rigorous researchers made Beijing oil chicken, Zhejiang Xianju chicken, Guangxi Sanhuang chicken, Hainan Wenchang chicken and Qingyuan ma chicken into white cut chicken, and then evaluated it from four dimensions: appearance, taste, aroma and texture. The results showed that Qingyuan Ma Chicken had the highest content of intermuscular and subcutaneous fat, so the flavor of chicken fat was obvious, the chicken skin was crisp and crisp, and the chicken meat was smooth and tender.
White cut seems to be the oldest and most orthodox practice about chickens. Graph / Network
Cantonese people eat chicken and pay attention to killing and eating now, which is a kind of gastronomic metaphysics. However, in recent years, in order to prevent and control avian influenza, the live poultry market nationwide has been closed in turn, and the fresh chicken policy has been continuously promoted. Since May 2019, live poultry trading has been banned in parts of Guangdong Province, and since then, raw chicken has been a neatly displayed fresh carcass on the counter, rather than a raw ingredient in chicken coops. For the people of Guangdong, although this will not destroy the world and the earth, it will definitely feel like a loss.
Source: People of the Day