More than a hundred miles away from Shijiazhuang City, Wuji County, there is such a noodle that makes the wanderers remember and haunt their dreams, it is a civilian cuisine - Wuji Dumplings.
It is a specialty noodle dish in Hebei, and Wuji is particularly famous. The birth of Wuji Bird can be traced back to more than three hundred years ago, according to the "Wuji County Chronicle", at the end of the Ming Dynasty, there was war and famine in the north, many Guanzhong people fled to Wuji, bringing the production skills of wontons, and since then this snack has taken root in the plain.
Over the centuries, Infinity Bird has been constantly integrated with local eating habits, gradually forming a unique taste and production technique. In 2012, the production technique of Wuji Bird was included in the list of intangible cultural heritage of Hebei Province.
It's a delicacy and a complex
When it comes to eating, I believe that everyone has a unique perspective. As the saying goes, one side of the water and soil to raise one side of the people, in Wuji County, wonton is not only a common delicious food, but also a complex, but also involves local people cultural relics, customs, living habits and many other aspects.
In the past, whenever Wuji got married and married, the New Year's Festival, wonton was a staple food that must be eaten. The day before the wedding is also called "An Shed", lunch to eat dumplings, commonly known as "An Shed Dumplings up the car cake", "An Shed eats dumplings, white heads can grow old". Every year Chinese New Year's Eve, every household eats wontons, "at the end of the year, the whole family and (rao) happy (饹)". The second dragon of the second month of the lunar calendar looks up, there is a saying of "great luck, eating birds", which is called "the old road of the dragon line is rich in grains, and people eat birds and run through", indicating that the year is prosperous and prosperous.
As far as the popularity of wonton is concerned, in the countryside of Wuji, not only do families love to eat wontons, but also children play family games that also sing about wontons: "A bowl of wontons, with more vinegar; sour and fragrant, eat noodles and drink soup; do not eat for a few days, itchy in the heart; eat a bowl, and then serve it." "Harmony" and "Harmony" are unique expressions of people's expectation of peace and happiness.
Legend has it that Bao Gong especially likes to eat Wuji Dumplings. Once the charter road passed through Wuji County, just arrived at the west gate of the county seat, I smelled a burst of birds, hurried into a bird's nest restaurant, and asked the shop Xiao Er to "quickly serve the three bowls of birds". Shop Xiao Er deliberately increased the portion, full of it, and said to Bao Zheng: "You can eat these three bowls of dumplings, and my nose will let you hit three mallets." Bao Gong said, "If I can't finish eating, let you pour three bowls of sweet vinegar into my nose and eyes." Who knew that this tired and hungry black-faced Bao Gong had eaten three bowls in one go, and also drank three bowls of sweet vinegar, and shouted: "Shop little two, take the mallet quickly!" "The shop boy scared away early in the morning. Although this is just a joke, it also shows the love of Wuji people for birds. The local habit of eating wontons always likes to add more vinegar, saying that "it is fun to show the sour head to eat it.".
Wuji is a thousand-year-old county, the folk customs are simple, the millennium Tuotuo River witnesses the simple and generous temperament of the people here, "the birds are long, the soup is fragrant, relatives and friends eat to help each other", a bowl of dumpling noodles, which is not only a food for guests to relieve hunger, but also an expression of family affection in the township.
Taste emphasizes a "fresh"
As a local snack that has been passed down for hundreds of years, Wuji Dumplings are exquisitely made, the ingredients are exquisite, and the taste always emphasizes a "fresh" word, "fresh" is the soul from beginning to end and through to the end.
Believe it or not, its raw materials should be selected from freshly ground soba noodles, the main ingredients are fresh; and the noodles should be eaten fresh and pressed fresh; before the dumplings are served in the bowl, a handful of fresh mung bean sprouts should be grabbed at the bottom, with a century-old soup, sprinkled with fresh and delicious brine meat, garlic paste and coriander minced, at this moment, this aroma instantly stimulated by the hot soup has made people impatient. Pick a spoon into the mouth, tendon, soft, light, smooth, fresh, spicy, fragrant several tastes mixed together, on the tip of the tongue to turn the river upside down. The fresh aroma of Infinity Bird brings diners an unprecedented wonderful experience.
The Chinese diet is characterized by clever combinations, using a combination of ingredients, cooking and stewing, and exerting the diversity of their tastes. The Qing Dynasty scholar Yuan Ming had his own unique experience, he said in the "Suiyuan Menu": "Why is the method of cooking different? Where a thing is cooked, it must be assisted. It is necessary to make the clear ones match the clear, the thick ones match the thick ones, the soft ones match the soft ones, and the rigid ones match the rigid ones, so that there is harmony and harmony. "At this point, Wuji Bird can be regarded as a very unique skill, beef and mutton, chives, bean sprouts, leeks... They are all common ingredients, well matched, and the ordinary is seen in the meticulous. In the selection of main ingredients, in order to cater to the tastes of northern diners, pure buckwheat or mixed with white noodles, elm skin noodles, yam noodles and so on. One or more of the ingredients are carefully proportioned to form a different taste of the bird. It is accompanied by a century-old pot soup, which is mellow and fragrant, fragrant but not greasy. The side dishes are properly meated, the color is bright, and the chewing taste is rich and layered.
Local old food eats wontons pay more attention to more, more selection of head soup noodles and stall noodles, head soup noodles are the first pot to eat early, soup clear noodles fragrant, there is an original taste. The noodles are the last to be boiled, and the soup is boiled for a day, and the accumulated nutrients are the richest.
Bird is a coarse grain, there is a human body "scavenger" reputation, contains starch, protein, amino acids, vitamin B1, B2, rutin, magnesium and other nutrients, to help digestion, take away the body toxins, for the internal organs to support a protective umbrella of dietary therapy. The utensils for serving birds are mostly made of large bowls of coarse porcelain common in the folk, with ancient shapes, which are combined with birds, simple and natural.
Unique production tips
Behind a bowl of pure infinity birds, there is a food chain from Gansu to Northern China, from the west to the Central Plains, spanning thousands of miles.
China has thousands of years of history of growing buckwheat, legend has it that buckwheat originated from the wild buckwheat of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, 2500 years ago in the Western Zhou Dynasty, there was a record of buckwheat cultivation, the Book of Poetry sings: "See Er like a yarrow, yi I hold the pepper", "Tsuba" is buckwheat. China's Great Northwest and northern Hebei Province are the main buckwheat producing regions. Buckwheat has coral-like wheat stems, with pink and carmine flowers, when the flowers bloom all over the field, the scene is spectacular, Fan Cheng praised it: "The sunset and green mountains are good, and the buckwheat is full of fangzhou." "This ancient crop rooted in the yellow land, from sowing to harvesting, from grinding to pressing, has been skillfully processed by countless people, and finally turned into a mellow bird delicacy on the table of Wuji people."
In the north, buckwheat flour can be made into a variety of foods, grilled cakes, steamed dumplings, soba pancakes... Among them, the main snack is not a bird. The famous birds in Hebei include Ningjin West Guan Bao, Wei County Shenjia Bao and so on. Inheriting the traditional practice, Wuji Wonton incorporates the characteristics of local pasta production, and stands out among many wonton snacks, with more than a dozen dishes such as grinding noodles, mixing noodles, and noodles, pressing, passing water, fishing sheng, and adding old soup.
For the dumplings to be delicious, soba noodles are key. Peel the newborn buckwheat of the year, grind it on the machine, and finely sift it to remove impurities. Infinity bird has a fine surface specially ground with buckwheat core. The core is not the same as the softness and hardness of the outside, the first grinding of the core is the easiest to become powder, the grinding out of the noodles is white, such buckwheat noodles are the most tendon, and the white and delicate wontons pressed into it are pure and delicate.
The press is the most fun. A large wooden bed, against the steaming pot of birds, the reconciled soba noodles are stuffed into round holes, pressed down hard, the wooden bar makes a creaking sound, and in an instant, the birds are like drizzle and fall into the hot pot, and the ancient poets praised it as "silver wire leaking long". I saw that the master's arm was slightly raised, and the bird bird shaped like a filament was like a flying cloud, falling into the bowl, neatly aligned, no more and no less just a bowl. Don't underestimate this "bowl picking" skill, like the "one-size-fits-all" of the meat seller and the "one grasp" of the salesman, and it is really impossible to do it in a few years.
The dumplings in the bowl are bright in color and delicate as crafts. There are two kinds of meat and vegetarian, the meat is fragrant but not greasy, and the vegetarian bird is light and refreshing. A bowl of birds is served on the table, and the enticing aroma wafts through the room. Whether it is Shanxi knife-cut noodles, Shaanxi Zhenzi noodles or Lanzhou beef noodles, you must challenge your taste buds with this conflicting aroma at the beginning. Different from the lightness of southern snacks, this aroma is domineering and aggressive, even if it is a lonely and quiet night, at the end of overtime, you order a bowl of dumplings in the small shop when the supper, it can also rely on its own strength, stirring the cold space around it, so lips and teeth touch, feast, and half a bowl into the stomach in the blink of an eye.
Summer bird over cold water to eat, is a good product to cool off the summer; winter poured on the hot bone soup, add a large spoonful of refined chili oil, the soup fresh noodles fragrant, smooth and delicious, people eat sweating, comfortable, can't help but call a "comfortable"!
Birds also have good partners
In Wuji, there is a kind of freshly made baked cake that is a good partner for wontons. The stove is made of a large farm jar, the charcoal fire is placed underneath, and the raw cake blank covered with sesame seeds is pasted on the smooth inner wall, baked slowly, and the baked cake after baking is slightly raised, and the internal layer is bitten open, and the caramel is crispy. This kind of cylinder oven cake must be baked in a charcoal fire oven, if it is made by electric stove, it will have no appearance and greatly reduced flavor. When eaten, the burnt cake can be used as a staple food and served with dumpling soup. The baked cake is broken up and soaked in the soup, and the baked cake is soft when it meets the soup water, and it quickly sucks up the delicious taste of the fresh soup, so that the two different foods of the cake noodles are combined, in the form of Cantonese wonton, which integrates the length of noodles and wontons, and also the style of Xi'an beef and mutton steamed buns. In the past, in the wuji rural market, where there were dumpling stalls, they would be accompanied by a baking oven, two kinds of interdependent snacks, which have been the "brothers and sisters" in the civilian food industry for hundreds of years.
Although it was the imperial food of the imperial palace in the Qing Dynasty, in the final analysis, it was still the people's own home-cooked snacks. In the past years when materials were scarce, most of the people who ate wontons were ordinary people, and wontons represented a dull day. A steaming bowl of "dumpling noodles", even the soup with water swallowed into the stomach, solved the problem of hunger, but also made people feel comfortable and warm. Today, whether in the city or in the countryside, the red-hot bird stalls embody the love of Wuji people for it, and the diners who come and go are both ordinary people and large-scale rich households, and it is this ordinary thing that constitutes the origin of civilian life, which is from snacks to big tastes, and the taste of the years that can never be forgotten.
(Xu Dongpo/Article published in The 14th edition of Yanzhao Metropolis Daily on August 23, 2019)