Source: Science and Technology Daily
Species notes
The Zhou Li Tianguan (周礼天官) says: "Where it is appropriate to eat, cattle are suitable for meals, sheep are suitable for millet, pigs are suitable for millet, dogs are suitable for sorghum, geese are suitable for wheat, and fish is suitable for rice." This is the earliest record of "eating six grains" in ancient times. It is said that for those who can eat, beef should be eaten with rice food, mutton should be eaten with millet food, pork should be eaten with millet food, dog meat should be eaten with sorghum food, goose meat should be eaten with wheat food, and fish should be eaten with amaranth food. According to this, the Eastern Han Dynasty classicist Zheng Xuan commented on the "six grains" as "稌, 黍, 稷, 粱, wheat, 苽".
Among them, the amaranth is the rice, and there are also titles such as carved beard and zibaizi. It is the seed of the perennial aquatic root herb of the family Poaceae. Most of them are wild, growing in shallow ditches or low-lying swamps, preferring warm and humid environments; generally 1-2.5 meters tall, the aboveground stems are hugged by leaf sheaths, some of them are submerged in the soil, the leaves are long lanceolate, and they die in winter; the underground creeping stems are longitudinal, and new tillers are extracted from the underground rhizomes in spring, forming new plants, and new whiskers and roots occur from the short shrunken stems of the new plants, and the axillary buds germinate and produce new tillers, so that they multiply generation after generation.
If it is not parasitic by smut fungus, it will pick up spikes in summer and autumn. The flowers are purple-red, apically conical inflorescence, hermaphroditic, with female flowers on the upper part and male flowers on the lower part. After fertilization, long spikes grow and form black seeds, narrowly cylindrical, with pointed ends; peel off the shell, the rice grains are white, and they are cooked and edible. Li Shizhen of the Ming Dynasty had a specific description in the "Compendium of Materia Medica": "Carved Hu September stems, flowers like reeds." It is strong and long, harvested after frost, as large as a thatched needle, and the skin is black and brown. The rice is very white and creamy, and the rice is crispy. ”
Rice is the grain of the Zhou Dynasty, and the rice cooked with it is slender, smooth but not sticky, refreshing but not dry, and fragrant. The poetry collection "Chu Ci" at the end of the Warring States period, in its "Great Moves" section, records that during the sacrifice, "only the sorghum was set up". Song Yu, a Chu Cifu family, said in the "Irony Endowment": "The daughter of the master, for the courtiers to cook the rice of Hu, cook the soup of lukui." ”
In the Qin and Han Dynasties, the consumption of rice was still common. Han Meicheng's "Seven Hairs" says: "The food of Chu Miao, the meal of Anhu, the confusion of the sword, the scattering of one sip... It is also the most beautiful in the world. Northern Wei Jia Sixun's "Qi Min Zhi Shu" also introduced the practice of rice: "In the sac of Shengwei in the valley, pound the porcelain as crumbs, do not make the end, the inner wei sac is full, and the plate is kneaded to take the rice." One can be used in half a liter. Cooking is like rice. ”
It is precisely because the rice occupies an important position in the ancient grain, the rice made of the rice is not only full of hunger and stomach, but also fragrant and smooth, so it has won the love of many poets and inkers. Du Fu Shiyun: "Slippery Memories of Carved Hu Rice, Fragrant Smelling Brocade With Soup"; Li Bai Shiyun: "Kneel into the carved Hu Rice, Moon Guangming Vegetarian Plate"; Du Mu Shiyun: "Mo Xiaoxiang Is Less People, Water Is More Rice On the Bank of Berry Moss"... All these good sentences are an appreciation for the rice.
In the dynasties after the Tang and Song dynasties, the grain was gradually replaced by the use of russet white in the dish, and it was not easy to eat the rice, but there were still people who recorded or recalled. Ming Gaolian's "Eight Notes on Zunsheng" says: "Withered Rice: Carved Rice, now Hu Liye." Dry out and wash. Make rice, the incense is indescribable. ”
Why do we grow only white and not flower and produce seeds? It has been studied mainly because the syrup is infected with a smut fungus during its growth. This pathogen can secrete indoleacetic acid, which stimulates the flower stem of the syrup and makes it unable to develop normally; over time, as the mycelium multiplys and spreads, the sycamore loses the ability to flower and seed. At the same time, the stem cells at the tip of the capsule divide rapidly, and a large amount of nutrients are transported and stored to this part, resulting in a fat and full fleshy stem, that is, the white of the vegetables.
The long white rice does not produce rice, and the white rice does not grow white. In order to harvest more russet white, people constantly choose those that are easily infected by smut fungus and grow into russet white to cultivate, rather than committing to cultivating "male" (people call it male rice) to harvest rice. Moreover, compared with other cereal crops, the flowering period is not only too long, the seeds are easy to fall off, the harvest is difficult, and the area is fertilizer-consuming, the yield is extremely low, far less than the cost-effectiveness of planting russet, so the farmers will pull it out as soon as they find it, and only cultivate the stench with smut fungus. In this way, the rice is gradually eliminated.
(The author is a member of the China Science Writers Association)