Lamb in the sauce of the water town

Xinshi is a relatively rich town in the water network area of Hangjia Lake, and when I was a child, the adults around me were always very proud and said, "Well, I know that our new city is called Little Shanghai." "In my memory, I always feel that my hometown is the most prosperous in the surrounding counties and towns, and there is a sense of superiority in the small area, so that when I occasionally meet my peers in the surrounding areas when I was a teenager, they would always say that the people of Xinshi were very proud, and most of them were a little repellent of outsiders. But put into the current language expression, is it not said to be - envy, jealousy and hate!

Saying so much is nothing more than trying to evoke the memories of the prosperous economy of that little Shanghai when I was a child. Among the flavor booms, there should be lamb with sauce. And why did the sauce lamb choose Xinshi or why xinshi gave birth to the old taste of this century-old heritage.

Check some information, as early as the end of the Qing Dynasty in 1874, Xinshi has a direct passenger ship to Shanghai, in other words, the New City passenger ship has a history of 140 years, so the name of Small Shanghai is enough to prove that the economy of Xinshi is prosperous in history. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the People's Republic of China, Xinshi had a sheepskin wool trade with the same name as Nanxun silk, and the small sheepskin was exported to the West, and there were special wool offices in the Qing Dynasty, and there were fur associations in the Republic of China. At that time, the small lambskin had strict preservation requirements, and the sheepskin was easy to rot after a long time in the trade process, so it had to be transported to Shanghai within 24 hours for processing, and then exported to Europe across the ocean.

Because of the development of the sheepskin business, a large number of by-products were produced - mutton. The abundant supply of lamb ingredients also provided a stage for chefs in Xinshi to display their talents, and at that time, Xinshi was an important place for many Hui merchants to go to Shanghai, Suzhou and other places to do business, whether it was along the Xin'an River or the Hanghui Ancient Road, the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal was the preferred path. The departure from Hangzhou to Xinshi is just the place where the night of the road is rectified, so many Hui merchants have integrated the characteristics of heavy color, heavy oil and heavy fire in the hui cuisine technique while eating mutton.

To this day, lamb noodle shops still maintain this habit, the lamb is cut freshly from the large pot of the earthen wood stove, and then put into a high bowl, poured into the pot of thick sauce and fragrant soup, and then sprinkled with red millet pepper, garlic leaf foam, ginger foam before serving, and then appears in front of diners. Lamb is eaten in the new market with locally produced glutinous rice yellow. Whenever the lamb is eaten almost in glutinous beige, the diners will let the boss put two or two small noodles into the lamb soup, eat it with satisfaction while it is hot, push the bowl forward, and drink a cup of hot black tea to relieve the grease. A winter day begins in such warmth. The sauced lamb in a bowl is called lamb dumplings in the new city, and the name is unknown, but I myself have imagined that it is the meaning of happiness after taking dumplings, because there is a similar food in the new city that is also called - duck dumpling noodles.

I don't remember how old I was, but I remember the taste of winter as the smell of the strong meat. There is an old man named Wubao downstairs in the house, and the old man is a five-guarantee household, single, childless and childless. A few of us children would often go to him to find some snacks, and the old man really liked us, and would always play tricks to find some dried fruit to satisfy our appetite for good food in that era when the material was not yet full.

The old man of wubao is very particular about the sense of ceremony in winter. In the early morning of winter, he would go to the lamb noodle shop on Yangxing Street to eat the first soup lamb noodles. At that time, Wu Baoye would put on a cup of local glutinous beige, squint his eyes and pick up the meat and throw it into his mouth and chew it carefully, a kind of comfortable enjoyment that may be a rare comfortable time of the year. Because Yangxing Street is a necessary route for me to go to junior high school every day, I can often see the old man's proud and leisurely appearance in the winter morning. The old man would also see me drinking at the old-fashioned four-immortal table and would say hello to me. He would always smile and squint and say, "Come and eat a piece of meat, warm up and go to school." I would always respond with a smile, "Old man, you eat slowly, drink slowly, I have eaten." "When I speak, my footsteps will not stop for a moment, but I am not afraid of being late for reading, but I am afraid that once I stop, I will not be able to resist the temptation of the lamb." In that era when I was still growing up, when three meals a day could not be commonly eaten meat, I still think that I must not be able to resist the bowl of oily, red and bright color, charming sauce, which can stir all my taste buds.

Every year during the New Year, my father would always think of ways to make a pot of lamb for ourselves. Because that is the salary of my parents to cover my sister and my daily expenses, as well as the daily expenses of the family, there is not much redundant money in the family. Therefore, it is impossible for us to go down to the restaurant to make a tooth sacrifice like the Five Treasures To satisfy the desires of the mouth. Fortunately, when my father was young, he was also a self-taught folk chef among his neighbors and relatives and friends, and he cooked a good dish. Therefore, there is lamb sauce in the New Year dishes at home, and every time at this time, I will volunteer to help the chef watch the heat and guard the stove to add firewood. In order to rush out of the pot before the head of the pot meat, my father is also happy, I have this little careful thought, which is also a way for my father who is not good at words to express his love.

Father's sauce lamb recipe

Ingredients: Half a goat or two hind legs of a goat

Red dates; brown sugar; [sugarcane skin and sugarcane stalks]; star anise; fennel; ginger; garlic head; red yeast; lake sheep soy sauce; Shaoxing rice wine; salt; shallot knots.

Directions: 1: Cut the lamb into large pieces, put in cold water, add ginger, cooking wine, green onion knots, bring to a boil over high heat, skim off the foam, pick up the lamb, rinse well.

2: In an iron pot, add sugarcane skin and sugarcane tips, add lamb, and wrap the above ingredients into gauze and put them in the pot.

3: Kasho wine, red yeast rice, soy sauce, brown sugar, salt, add the sheep broth in front.

4: Boil over high heat for 25-30 minutes and simmer for 2.5-3 hours.

5: Remove the bones before cooking, put the meat into a bowl, sprinkle the minced ginger before serving, crush the garlic leaves, and add the millet pepper as appropriate.