Speaking of Macheng meat cake, it will definitely arouse the deep feelings of every Macheng person. Every time there is a major festival, or a happy occasion at home, the "meat cake table" will shine on the scene, and the "meat cake table" is the most grand feast we have here: the pieces of long striped, yellow and tender meat cakes, layer by layer in the middle of the white dish, sprinkled with green onions, red goji berries, drizzled with bright hooks, so that no Macheng person can suppress the temptation in the throat. Of course, Macheng is the land of filial piety, although delicious at present, a table of people is still polite, everyone is to let the elderly people on the table move chopsticks first, and then everyone else is humble to start the food journey. And their own chopsticks only move the ingredients facing their own side, absolutely can not stir in the plate, specifically pick their favorite hands, so that they will be spit on by others: whose child is this, how can there be no gifts! If it is your own child, it must be a chopstick knocking on the head, whispering: to understand the rules! This is us Macheng people, a city with a strong cultural heritage.
The Spring Festival is coming, and the children are about to rush home from all over the world to reunite. Around the time of the 24th lunar month, the familiar sound of "bang bang" came from the kitchen of every household, and we knew that this was the beginning of making the hometown delicacy - meat cake.
The meat cake production is somewhat exquisite, pork should use pork belly, fish meat is made of silver carp, and powder is made of amaranth flour. Pork and fish must be chopped, generally manually chopped with a knife, the taste is much better than using mechanical crushing. Pork, fish, amaranth flour in accordance with the ratio of 6:10:4 blending, the most important thing is the mixing and blending link, we call it "playing", to the most powerful people in the family to stir by hand, the meat and fishmeal in proportion to a large bowl, while mixing with water, while stirring, the more uniform and elastic the stirring, the better.
This is followed by steaming over a wood stove, using a bamboo steamer. Pour the beaten fish powder into the steamer basket and stack it layer by layer, then cook it over high heat. After 30 minutes, a smell comes to the nose, open the lid, wow! The meat cake is fluffy and bulging high, and it is said that the higher the meat cake is, the more it is a sign of luck in the new year.
Every time after the first cage of meat cakes was steamed, my father always took matters into his own hands, cut a square piece of meat cake underneath, put it on a plate, inserted a chopstick, respectfully brought it to the table of the hall to offer, lit incense candles, and sacrificed to the ancestors, which seemed very sacred. After the sacrifice, we began to enjoy the meat cake delicacy. Parents will also cut a piece to the next door home, let everyone come to taste the hot meat cake, everyone will be full of praise, parents in praise straightened the waist bar of hard work, happy to laugh. Whenever I ask why I insert chopsticks when I offer offerings, it turns out that this is a rule left by our ancestors, telling us not to forget Ben: Most of us in Macheng City immigrated from Chopsticks Lane in Jiangxi. No wonder, we have always called Jiangxi people old watches, it turned out that there is such a bitter history that cannot be abandoned. A cage of Macheng meat cake, how much nostalgia, no matter where you go, you can't forget the book, because behind you, is the father and fellow countrymen full of blessings and ardent expectations.
In the time of my parents, material life was very poor, but spiritual and cultural life was abundant. On the first day of the Chinese New Year, neighbors visit each other to visit the New Year and wish each other the arrival of the New Year, and we all want to thank you with a cup of tea. On the second day of the Chinese New Year, it is a New Year's greeting between relatives. When relatives came, my mother always had to cut the meat cake into long strips, cook it in a pot, sprinkle it with green onions, steaming hot, full of aroma, put it in a bowl, bring it out with a wooden red lacquer square plate, and then place a bowl on the Eight Immortals table, beckoning everyone to taste. Relatives will consciously sit down in order of the elder and the young: generally the longest person sits on the right hand side of the Eight Immortals Table, followed by the left hand side, above and below, thousands of years of virtue of respecting the old and loving the young are passed down from generation to generation. According to the custom, when tasting meat cakes, you can't eat ugly, everyone just tastes one or two pieces, and then drinks soup, puts down the bowl and chopsticks, and is called "back to the bowl". You must not eat and drink all of them, and appear to have no tutor (of course, this custom has improved greatly with hygiene habits). After tasting the meat cake, out of courtesy, be sure to praise the taste of the meat cake, which is a kind of respect for the maker of the gourmet meat cake, so that the hard-working mother has a sense of success satisfaction. And after tasting the perfect meat cake, before going out, the elders will definitely take out the pre-prepared pressed money from their pockets and stuff it into the hands of the children in the family. The mother will be humble, the child, in the heart looking forward to pressing the old money, the eyes will look at the mother for a while, the elder will look at the elders, while shaking their heads and saying no, while looking forward to hurrying "to my bowl." The elders laughed and said don't look down on it, they forced me to give me the money to press the age, and I, according to the joy in my heart, reluctantly sent the elders to the door to leave. Then he quickly turned around and went into the bedroom, counting the money over and over again, repeating his shopping plan in his mind, and finally handing it over to his mother. Mother, put the money under my pillow, stayed until the evening with a lot of new year's imagination, beautiful into sleep. ......
This is our Macheng, a town of etiquette, and the fragrant meat cake cuisine is full of the taste of hometown. So that no matter where we go, we can always remember our hometown, "Where is Nippon Pass, the most beautiful Macheng meat cake table"!
(Original author of the article: Song Lai, Macheng Drum Tower Central School)