Braised pork is an ordinary farmhouse dish, and there are more than twenty home-cooked recipes throughout the country, one of which is called "Mao's Braised Pork", which is said to be Chairman Mao's favorite flavor of that year.
We all know that Chairman Mao's life is simple, he is not very particular about food, clothing, housing and transportation, his old man's blanket can be covered for decades, in terms of eating, people are most impressed by his recipe is that "braised meat".
So why did Chairman Mao like braised pork? What is the difference between the braised pork that Chairman Mao ate?
Now the material life is relatively rich, everyone on some high oil, high sugar, high calorie food are more rejected, when it comes to the "braised meat" dish, there are many people think that it is rough, greasy, not those sea cucumber abalone appears to be high-grade, but in the past in our country those days of lack of materials, this dish is the most popular.
Especially after the founding of New China, people knew that the beloved Chairman Mao liked to eat "braised pork", and the fame of this dish became more and more widespread.
So why did Chairman Mao prefer braised pork? This is mainly related to a person, and it is precisely because he made this ordinary home-cooked dish into a delicious dish that "braised pork" has become a lingering taste in Chairman Mao's life.
This person is Li Kaiwen, he is a native of Jinzhai, Anhui, joined the Red Army at the age of 35, it is rumored that his ancestors were famous cooks, he once cooked for Zhu Yuanzhang, the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, and during the Yan'an period, Li Kaiwen was organized to give Chairman Mao, Chen Yun and other leaders as full-time cooks because he cooked a good dish.
It was Li Kaiwen's superb cooking skills and the simple and rough ingredients that made delicious meals that Made Chairman Mao and other state leaders taste a little delicious in the difficult years.
When Li Kaiwen first joined the Red Army, he was already 35 years old, because of poverty, war, natural disasters, and plagues, at the age of 35, he had already passed the peak period of his body, and he was considered an "old man", so at the beginning of his enlistment, Li Kaiwen was taken care of by the organization, and did not send him to the front line to fight, but was responsible for carrying stretchers and taking care of wounded soldiers.
During this period, Li Kaiwen performed well, was conscientious and responsible, was soon promoted to the squad leader of the stretcher team, a leadership inspection, ate the food made by Li Kaiwen, felt very delicious, under detailed inquiry, only to know that Li Kaiwen's family has been a cook for generations, and his ancestors also cooked for Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty.
Knowing Li Kaiwen's specialty, the organization immediately arranged him into the cooking class, and from then on, there was an additional "old squad leader" in the new Red Army team.
Although at that time, our army was short of materials, and only coarse grains and wild vegetables could be eaten, and some soldiers were still very young when they had long bodies, but Li Kaiwen always tried his best to make the meals more delicious. Let the warriors eat as much as they can,
In 1935, the Red Army began the 25,000-mile Long March, Li Kaiwen's cooking class also marched with the army, when crossing the meadow, due to continuous rainfall, the ground was very muddy, and there was not even hay for cooking on fire.
In order to make the tired Red Army soldiers drink a mouthful of hot soup and rice, Li Kaiwen thought of a way, he carried a handful of wet grass into his arms, dried it by his body temperature, and finally lit a campfire, the soldiers ate hot rice and drank hot water, but Li Kaiwen fell ill, and for several days he had a high fever and almost couldn't walk out of the grass.
Li Kaiwen's spirit of self-denial for the public was spread more and more widely in the ranks, and the leaders at higher levels attached great importance to it; they visited Li Kaiwen, who was seriously ill, and gave him a new task, and after he recovered from his illness, he cooked for Chairman Mao and other central leaders.
Becoming a chef for Chairman Mao and others is not only the revolutionary enthusiasm shown by Li Kaiwen, but more importantly, the food he cooks is indeed delicious.
Legend has it that during the Hongwu period of the Ming Dynasty, Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang once returned to Fengyang to worship his ancestors, passing through the Xiangshan Temple in Jinzhai, Anhui, and heard that there was a local cook surnamed Li who made braised pork particularly delicious, so he deliberately got off the bed here, when Zhu Yuanzhang first tasted the Li family braised meat, immediately Long Yan was very happy, he rewarded the Li family chef, and brought this dish back to the palace, since then the local Li family cuisine has become famous, and later with the passage of time, the Li family has gradually declined, but the unique work of this "braised meat" has been passed down, and finally reached the hands of Li Kaiwen.
Li family's braised pork, very different from other methods, need to be burned with pine wood, the best pork belly cut into standard squares, after the cold oil is heated in the pot, put in ginger shreds to fry out the aroma, and then put the cut pork belly into the pot, stir-fry the oil on a small fire, and then put water after the grease is boiled, and finally add the Li family secret seasoning to color, wait for four hours after simmering, and then collect the juice on high heat, so that a plate of red braised meat with bright color and attractive aroma is made.
When Li Kaiwen was a teenager, he inherited this technology from his father, but at that time, natural disasters and man-made disasters, soldiers and horses were chaotic, Li Kaiwen was difficult to make a living from, there is an old saying called "hunger in a disaster year can not be a cook", but a chef like Li Kaiwen could not survive under that world, which shows that the society at that time was extremely dark.
The braised pork made by Li Kaiwen was soft and tender, fat but not greasy, and melted in the mouth, and Chairman Mao and other central leaders praised it after eating it, but in Yan'an at that time, materials were scarce, and only during the New Year's Festival or large-scale celebrations could Li Kaiwen's braised meat be tasted, and that bowl of "old squad leader braised meat" was the lingering memory of many leaders in Yan'an.
In fact, compared with cooking for soldiers, cooking for leaders is not easy, mainly because their working hours are not easy to control, and they do not eat on time, so Li Kaiwen and the guards of these leaders "collude" with each other, and once they find that the chairman and others are busy with work, they run to the kitchen in advance and let Li Kaiwen prepare to cook.
From the beginning of Yan'an to the founding of the People's Republic of China, in the past eleven years, Li Kaiwen has been by the chairman's side, and later the founding of New China, the organization considered that Li Kaiwen was older, and was ready to arrange him to be the director of the Tianjin Sugar Factory.
When he heard that the factory had more than a thousand employees, Li Kaiwen immediately refused, saying that he was a cook, and he had no culture, could not manage, could not add chaos to the country, and he asked to return to his hometown to work.
Anhui Jinzhai received instructions from his superiors, so he arranged work for Li Kaiwen, and in view of Li Kaiwen's qualifications, they were ready to make him deputy county magistrate, and Li Kaiwen was even more unhappy, saying that he had not read the book.
The comrades in the county explained that he, the deputy county magistrate, did not need specific work and only enjoyed the treatment of the deputy county level, and when Li Kaiwen heard this, he lost his temper and said, "If I just eat and don't do anything, it will be even worse. ”
In this way, Li Kaiwen became the director of a township grain management office, although the position was low, but he was very satisfied, and he worked diligently until retirement.
After Li Kaiwen left Chairman Mao, the braised pork made by other chefs was not liked by Chairman Mao, because Chairman Mao did not eat soy sauce, and soy sauce was a necessary seasoning for general braised meat, until the national treasure master Cheng Ruming, who thought of replacing soy sauce with sugar color and salt, and adding chili peppers to taste, was slightly in line with Chairman Mao's taste, and later this dish was called "Mao's braised meat".
In 1956, Li Kaiwen was rated as a model worker and came to Beijing again, and Chairman Mao was so happy that he invited Li Kaiwen to his home and once again tasted the braised pork that he had not seen for a long time.
Chairman Mao smiled at the dinner table and said to Li Kaiwen, "It is still the braised pork of the old squad leader that best suits my taste." ”