Bian Fugui | New Year's Memory (2) - Fried Cake
When I was a child, people in the village prepared New Year goods, usually steamed steamed steamed buns, spread flowers (to make tortillas), and fried oil cakes. Because these three things are the staple food of the villagers in the waxing moon. As soon as you enter the Layue family, you must be busy making a living for the New Year, eating lunch is not a morning, in advance these three staple foods are done well, frozen in the cold room, easy to eat.
At that time, in order to increase grain production and solve people's food problems, the state planted high-yield corn in a large area, and planted very little wheat with low yield, providing only 380 kilograms of basic rations for the members of the society throughout the year, only about 100 kilograms of white noodles, and one kilogram per capita of edible oil. In this case, the people in the village can rarely eat white noodle steamed buns, fried cakes and other delicacies, and every household saves the white noodles and yellow rice saved at the New Year. So when we were young, we most looked forward to the New Year, at least around the New Year, we could eat white-noodle steamed buns and fried cakes every day, and we could still eat enough, so fried cakes became my favorite staple food for the New Year.
On the day of making fried cakes, adults get up early, make a fire, boil water, mix cake noodles, and borrow steamed cakes.
When steaming the cake, the cake noodles should be mixed first, that is, the cake noodles are placed in the basin or a clean large basket and mixed with the right amount of water. This is the most technical and experienced part. When mixing, it is necessary to see whether the yellow rice is soft or not, that is, to understand the size of the stickiness of the rolled cake noodles, the stickiness is called soft yellow rice, and the small stickiness is called hard yellow rice. If the yellow rice is soft, add less water to the cake noodles, if it is hard, add more water to the cake noodles, and the softness of the yellow rice is determined by the soil environment in which the yellow rice grows. In addition to the amount of water added to be accurate, the temperature of the water is also exquisite. The cake noodles processed from soft yellow rice can be mixed with cold water, and the cake noodles processed from hard yellow rice should be slightly increased in temperature. The amount of water added, the level of water temperature is not fixed, all depends on experience. Therefore, if anyone is not sure of mixing the cake noodles, they must ask the neighbors and friends who can steam the cakes to help, including the relatives and neighbors who knead the cakes, and make an appointment the day before. People who come to help mix cake noodles and steam cakes come to the Lord's house at dawn, and it cannot be late, if this link is late, the back of the kneading cake and fried cake will have to be delayed.
After the cake noodles are mixed, they should be "flour cake noodles", that is, let the moisture and the cake noodles fully combine for a while. If there is still dry noodles after the "powder" is finished, you need to add some water until the cake noodles in the basin or in the large basket are all formed into thumb-sized balls, and the cakes can be steamed in the cage drawer.
The picture of yellow rice cake noodles comes from the Internet
When steaming the cake, the water in the pot must be open all the time to ensure that the pot is constantly steaming, otherwise it will not be steamed. In front of the cake in the cage drawer, a clean wet gauze should be placed under the cage drawer, one to prevent the cake from sticking to the cage drawer, and the other is to be afraid that the cake surface will leak into the pot, once it leaks in, the water will overflow into the cage drawer, and the "steamed" cake will become a "boiled" cake. The cake is cooked and sprinkled one layer to be steamed thoroughly. And so on until the cake is sprinkled all over the cage drawer, and finally covered with wet gauze. The lid is absolutely unusable, as it will produce "steam water" that will drip down and affect the quality of the cake.
After the cake is steamed, you can "carry the cake" on the large noodle case or in the large basin.
Carrying cake is a hard work, but also pay attention to a "fast" word, steamed cake is hard when it is cold, it is not easy to carry, so you must take advantage of the cake just out of the pot to carry. The men pulled their sleeves high, clenched their fists, quickly punched, pressed the cake on the noodle case, and each time they hit a few times, they had to quickly dip their fists in the cold water basin next to them to cool down, and when they finished carrying the cake, the knuckles of their hands would be burned red. After the cake is finished, a layer of sesame oil is applied to the skin to prevent dry skin, and then proceed to the next "cake kneading" procedure.
At this time, the sky is already bright, the female relatives and female neighbors who help have come one after another, they are talking and laughing, while pinching cakes while exchanging the hardships and harvests of doing housework in the past few days, the affection between relatives and neighbors, in this talking, laughing, nagging and la-la-la labor is heated up, and the feelings are sublimated.
The un-fried cake is called "vegetarian cake", which is placed there, golden, shiny, emitting a tantalizing aroma, and it is hot, soft and full of tendons, both a unique sweetness of the millet and a faint bitterness.
Everything is so strange, often the most fragrant things always have a hint of bitterness, the most beautiful things, there are always some flaws, the best things always have a little regret, maybe this is the way of heaven.
The picture of fried cake comes from the Internet
After the cake is kneaded, the cake can be fried. Pour aromatic, golden sesame oil into the large iron pot, and after the oil is boiled, you can slowly put the kneaded vegetarian cake into the pot against the edge of the pot, so that the cake is not easy to splash the oil to burn people. The vegetarian cake "snorted" in the boiling oil pot and bubbled up in a moment. People keep pinching out the fried cake and putting the vegetarian cake back into the pot. Because the oil smoke of flax oil is very large, the doors and windows must be opened when frying cakes. The smell of fried cakes spread to neighbors, to alleys, to the streets... Steamed steamed steamed buns with other people's homes, boiled meat flavor, fried meatball flavor, tofu flavor... Mixed together to form a strong "New Year's flavor".
The freshly made fried cakes are the best, full of bubbles, shiny, crisp on the outside and soft on the inside, golden and seductive. If dipped in amber sugar made with carrots or beets, it is delicious and sweet, it is a perfect match! Kids can eat seven or eight in one go. All the grain and oil products of that era did not have any fertilizer and pesticide pollution, and were truly pure natural green organic foods, coupled with people's long-term starvation, so that sweetness was impossible for modern people to appreciate.
After the fried cake is over, the host family will make a pot of pork powder soup to entertain the people who help, and will bring the hot, soft and slippery fried cake to the elders and neighbors, so that they can also share their happiness.
I often miss the poor boyhood, when life was hard, but people were kind and generous, and the gap between rich and poor between people was not large, and they could help each other, which was very affectionate. Although material is scarce, the spirit is very rich, and although life is difficult, it is full of happiness. People struggle in suffering, make pleasure in suffering, pursue in suffering, yearn and look forward to it in suffering, so every memory at that time is so warm and sweet.