"There are carp underneath and baked noodles on top. The color of the fish is translucent, the fish is tender, and the baked noodles are as fine as hair, fluffy and crispy. "Lafayette himself gave the name, what is the strange shape of carp baked noodles, which can make Lafayette delight in eating all the tastes of the mountains and the sea?"
Before the Qing Dynasty, there was no such dish as carp roasted noodles in Yu cuisine. At the end of the Qing Dynasty, in order to celebrate the birthday of Empress Dowager Cixi, this famous dish was produced.
In the 26th year of Guangxu (1900), the Eight-Nation Alliance captured Beijing, and the Guangxu Emperor and Empress Dowager Cixi fled to Xi'an. In the twenty-seventh year of Guangxu's "Xin Ugly Return to Luang", Guangxu and Cixi returned to Beijing and passed through Kaifeng, where they lived for more than a month. On the tenth day of the tenth month of the lunar calendar, coinciding with the 66th birthday of Empress Dowager Cixi, officials from all walks of life in Kaifeng dared to be sloppy! They urgently planned to prepare for the birthday feast. In order to please Lafayette, Inspector Kaifeng made a good "article" on the longevity face. Ingeniously, he had the chef fry the dragon's whisker noodles in oil, then cover them with the boiled soft carp and offer them to Cixi as longevity noodles.
When Cixi looked at Dayue, she saw that the fish was red and translucent, the fish was tender, and the baked noodles were as fine as hair, fluffy and crispy. She touched the chopsticks and tasted them, and couldn't help but applaud one after another. Cixi said happily after eating: "Forget to return after the meal." She ate this dish, and even the capital did not want to return. She asked again: What is the name of this dish? Kaifeng Inspector busy answer: This dish is not named, please Lafayette gift. Cixi Dao: There are carp underneath and baked noodles on the top, which is called carp baked noodles (now called sweet and sour soft boiled carp baked noodles). The crowd shouted long live the mountain, thanking Lafayette for the grace of his name. Since then, there has been this famous dish of carp baked noodles. The Guangxu Emperor also called it "a delicacy in the ancient capital". The accompanying officials also wrote a banner that read, "Where are the fish, Zhongzhou Gubei Prefecture" to the Kaifeng Fuya. The dish of carp roasted noodles has become a traditional representative dish of Yu cuisine.
In fact, carp noodles are a combination of two traditional dishes, soft boiled carp and roasted noodles, which each have a long history. Sweet and sour soft boiled carp is evolved from the Song Dynasty's Song sister-in-law fish soup, known as vinegar fish in the Jin Yuan period, called vinegar fish after improvement in the Ming Dynasty, and then developed and improved at the end of the Qing Dynasty, which was originally called sweet and sour soft boiled carp. Baked noodles are also known as dragon's whisker noodles. According to the "Record of Dreams", during the Ming and Qing dynasties, the Kaifeng people said that the second day of the second month of the lunar calendar every year was "the head of the dragon", and on this day, the dignitaries and dignitaries of the city and the townspeople gave each other gifts with dragon whiskers to show their auspiciousness. The dragon's whisker noodles were originally boiled and eaten with marinade. Later, due to the Cixi birthday feast, it was changed to fried.
This article is excerpted from Elephant Publishing House's "Rare Things in Bieliang City"