As the saying goes, there are three hardships in life, punching boats, striking iron, and grinding tofu.
The tofu making process seems simple, in fact, there are many trivial details in the middle, which require care and great effort to make tofu to be delicious.
The energy invested is large, and it is not unreasonable to get up early and do it greedily, so it is not unreasonable to say that grinding tofu is a bitter.
It is said that tofu, a wonderful and ancient ingredient, was originally a by-product of Taoist alchemy. Liu An, the king of Huainan, wanted to get the elixir of immortality, and invited thousands of guests to conduct alchemy experiments.
At that time, the Huainan area was rich in high-quality soybeans, and these people used local materials to cultivate Danmiao with soybean juice in alchemy.
Once inadvertently using the tofu pulp juice in the plaster point, a chemical change occurred, and a bunch of white flower flesh and flesh took shape.
Liu An couldn't help but taste it, and found that this thing tasted fresh and smooth, soft and moist, and couldn't help but praise it after eating it, and continued to study and make.
Since then, tofu has come into this world and has become a home-cooked ingredient for the general public.
There is no elixir in the world, but this by-product has made an inexhaustible delicacy that can be enjoyed for generations.
There are different forms and variations, there are white squares (tofu), coffee-colored flat blocks (dried tofu), goose yellow cicada wings (tofu skin), milky white paper (thousand sheets), silky milk milk (soy milk), on this basis, plus side dishes or a variety of fried steamed stew, you can derive a variety of delicious.
Therefore, foreign friends often lament the art of Chinese food, between "like" and "non": making one ingredient like another ingredient ("like"), or making an ingredient completely invisible ("non").
Tofu is a typical example of the past and the future, no matter the north and south of the river, there is no objection to choosing it as a representative of Chinese ingredients.
Soybeans are ground into a pulp with water, salt or gypsum is used to "point", produce a wonderful chemical reaction, put into a wooden mold, through gauze, and patiently squeeze excess water with heavy objects, "old" and "tender", depending on the amount of water content.
From beans to tofu, it seems simple, in fact, it is very laborious, and now the tofu factory mass production, the efficiency is doubled, coupled with the low price and good quality, few people do it themselves.
In the north, when it is winter, it is cold, and some people will line up the old tofu and put it on the roof of the ice and snow, and after the natural low temperature, it will freeze into a white jade brick-like hard.
But when slid into the hot pot, it is again a spongy loose soft with holes.
Take a bite and ambush the hot and hot soup in it, just like the sound of firecrackers in the new year, gushing up, making people tremble and tremble.
The advice of the ancestors unconsciously formed a proverb: "You can't eat hot tofu in a hurry." ”
Tofu in the south is endless. Shaoxing people love to eat tofu skin, is soy milk boiling, condensed on the surface of a layer of film coating, with a bamboo skewer gently picked out the water to dry, thick shredded cold mix cucumber, refreshing. Thin under in the rice noodle soup, silky.
Or make a square, wrap the meat foam wild vegetables, tie it with a green onion, make it into the shape of a pomegranate, and then fry it crispy in hot oil and eat it for a bite, which is unforgettable - hangzhou's "fried bell" is also the same.
Not only the common people, but even the monks have a special love for tofu.
The monks do not eat meat and fish, and push the "simulation" of tofu to the realm of both gods and forms.
The tofu skin is stacked and braised and cut into pieces, resembling the most plump part of the goose leg, called "vegetarian roast goose".
Oil tofu is quenched in a miso soup to a dark coffee color, salty and sweet, and is named "vegetarian beef" or "vegetarian small intestine".
The best of all is the "Dongpo meat" of Wudang chefs: lean meat (gluten and tofu puree), fat (konjac tofu), pork skin (tofu skin) steamed into shape, poured with secret sauce, the taste is almost the same as meat.
Yangzhou's three knives are famous all over the world, and the most famous knife workers have to take "Wensi tofu" to try. A piece of nan tofu with a water content of up to 90% can be broken, but it is necessary to use a clumsy Yangzhou kitchen knife to cut off the old skin and cut into thousands of filaments.
After blanching in boiling water, it is still clear, not broken or rotten, like a crystal clear fan.
This dish was pioneered by the monk Wensi of Tianning Temple in Yangzhou, but it has become a practice of the chef in the secular world
For thousands of years, regardless of the north and south, our farming people have grown beans, ground beans, and eaten tofu in order to survive and reproduce better.
Derived from a soybean, whether it is the ingredients or the world's hundreds of forms, like "Tao Sheng one, life two, two life three, three life all things", this kind of diligence and wisdom is enough to make the world breathtaking.
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