Yuyuan, also known as Fish Dumpling, is a famous traditional cuisine in the Jianghan Plain of Chuxiang Hubei Province, which is the best in E's cuisine and is also particularly loved by the people of Hubei. In the local folk, every New Year's Festival, a family banquet, or a wedding and funeral feast to invite relatives and friends, almost all have to cook this dish. The whiteness of the round color, the tenderness of its texture, the freshness of its flesh, and the beauty of its objects are all called the fine products of fish and food, and are well-known in ancient and modern times. It is said that the beautiful dish of fish round originated in the era of King Wen of Chu.
According to legend, after King Wen of Chu moved his capital to Ying (present-day Jiangling, Hubei), he was particularly fond of eating local fish, almost to the point of no vegetables and no fish. However, King Wen is a person who eats fish and does not spit out thorns, and every time he eats, he is always helpless in the face of abundant fish dishes. According to the "Chronicle of the Jing Chu Dynasty", once, after King Wen of Chu was stabbed in the throat by a fish, he immediately killed si yanguan in anger. After that, every time he cooked a fish feast for King Wen, he first had to behead and tail the live fish, peel it and remove the thorns. Nevertheless, it was inevitable that King Wen would not sometimes be annoyed by the fine prickly throat, and often in anger, he would drink and order the cook to be executed, so I don't know how many imperial chefs became ghosts under the knife, and many chefs fled to other places. From time to time, ministers suggested that a famous teacher should be hired to cook boneless fish dishes. When he received the permission of King Wen, he immediately wrote a list of recruitments.
The list was listed for several days, but no one dared to apply. Later, a famous chef was called to serve as the imperial chef of King Wen of Chu, but the fish dishes he cooked still could not satisfy King Wen. Seeing that bad luck was about to fall on his head, however, he could no longer think of a good way to do it, so he had to stand in front of the board, holding the kitchen knife in his hand, and slamming the fish pieces on the board with the back of the knife to vent his anger. Suddenly, he was surprised to find that the flesh of the fish was magically separated from the bones, and the flesh of the fish became a fine mushroom. At this time, it was almost time for King Chu Wen to eat, and in a hurry, he quickly mixed various seasonings with fish mushrooms, and then squeezed them into small rounds one by one, and poured them into chicken soup to offer Chu Wen Wang. And King Wen was surprised to see this exquisite and exquisite fish dumpling floating in the soup, when tasting, the entrance is thornless and slag-free, and it is soft and tender, and the quality and taste are good. King Vinhon was overjoyed and full of praise. Since then, the beauty of fish rounds has been produced.
After the special flavor of fish balls was produced, King Wen of Chu ordered it to be designated as a "national dish" and was not allowed to be passed on. As a result, the fish round dish became a treasure of the imperial court of successive dynasties, exclusively for the enjoyment of the imperial emperor. In the Yuan Dynasty, there were also fried fish balls called "fish bombs" as one of the "rare and exotic dishes" of the court. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the production of fish balls was gradually introduced to the people, and through the continuous improvement of chefs, the cooking skills were further improved. For example, the Qing Dynasty's large-scale dietary monograph "Tuning Ding Collection" includes a variety of fish ball preparation methods.
Since ancient times, the cooking of fish ball dishes has become a unique masterpiece of Hubei chefs. Nowadays, the fish balls cooked in Hubei are exquisitely shaped and have many varieties, such as orange petal fish balls, cream fish balls, three-color fish balls, heart fish balls, hollow fish balls, osmanthus fish balls, crystal fish circles, overlord fish circles, sea cucumber fish circles, assorted fish balls, and so on, and so on. In addition, it is also specially made into canned fish balls that have long been exported to various places and are well-known at home and abroad
In November 1983, at the appraisal meeting of the first national culinary master technical performance in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, Lu Yongliang, a young famous chef from Hubei who won the national "Best Chef" laurel, performed "Fish Circle", one of the E's cuisine projects, which was absolutely unique, and immediately won unanimous praise, and was widely praised by the national leaders and celebrities from all walks of life and the media circles at home and abroad. Since then, the hubei delicacy of the highest quality, the fish ball, has become more famous.