Author: Meng Chunming
Whether it is taste or color, bean juice can be regarded as the darkest dish in old Beijing.
One of the easiest ways to test whether a person is old Beijing is to ask him to drink bean juice. In the early years, bean juice was a common thing in street stalls, not worth the melons and dates, even today, it can not climb the elegant hall, never seen in a star hotel selling bean juice. Nevertheless, everyone is equal in front of the bean juice, and the scene of the peddlers and the angry horsemen huddled together to drink the bean juice is not uncommon, even today, it is still the case.
Entering a simple shop with bean juice for sale, I saw a large bowl of coarse porcelain filled with sour smell and gray bean juice in front of me, and it must be an old Beijinger who can drink two bowls in one go with spicy pickle shreds and scorched circles. And those who avoid it when they see this object are most likely not old Beijing. Of course, this is not a universal truth, many pure Beijingers do not drink bean juice, and some foreigners have a special love for bean juice, such as Mr. Cai Lan, a Hong Kong gourmet, who must drink bean juice every time he comes to Beijing. When the famous movie star Zhang Guorong was alive, he came to Beijing to look for bean juice and drank it sweatily.
Bean juice has a history of more than three hundred years, the eighteenth year of the Qianlong Qing Dynasty (1754), during a pilgrimage meeting, someone went to the temple to play the book and said about this thing, the Qianlong Emperor specially issued an edict on this: "Recently, the new bean juice has been sent to Yi Libu to check whether it is clean and drinkable, such as unclean things, with two or three bean juice smiths in the cloth, sent to the imperial dining room as an errand boy." Since then, this snack, which was originally a commoner, even a poor person, has ascended to the heavens and become a royal drink. Cixi is also one of the fans of bean juice, and Feng Decheng, who worked in the imperial dining room at the end of the Qing Dynasty, once had a crush on Ai Xinjueluo. Henglan said, "Cixi liked to drink bean juice the most, when she was a child, her family lived in Xinjiekou Da Er tiao, because her family was poor, she often used bean juice instead of vegetables, accompanied by old rice to fill her hunger, and after being elected to the palace, she also liked to drink it." After the Xianfeng Emperor died in the Rehe Palace, the two empresses of the East and West led the Tongzhi Emperor back to the palace and asked the imperial dining room for bean juice porridge to drink. (See Ai Shin Kyora. Heng Lan "Bean Juice and The Royal Dining Room". ）
What is good on the top will be worse for the bottom. The emperor and Lafayette cherished bean juice so much, the flag people naturally did not want to be left behind. So there is a saying that "bean juice bean juice, the lifeblood of the flag people". In the early years, some people saw near Qihua Gate (today's Chaoyang Gate), there were several people crying very sadly, passers-by were puzzled, asked the reason, the crying people said, the bean juice room is closed, don't you want people to die? Crying even more sadly, you can see the status of bean juice in the minds of the flag people. Fortunately, the bean juice shop is not a high-tech tip, one after another, there is no real life.
Hemp tofu
After half a day, what exactly is bean juice? It is the scrap for making mung bean fans. The scraps are served in a large vat or vat, and the soup that floats on it is the bean juice, and the thick sediment below is the raw material of another kind of old Beijing delicacy, hemp tofu. Bean juice is divided into three kinds, one is the original juice to boil the pot; the second is to add mung bean powder inside to improve its consistency; the third is the soybean juice in the home millet, cooked into porridge. Today, basically only the first kind exists.
In the early years, hemp tofu is not easy to buy, once Mr. Wang Shixiang in order to entertain friends, specially boiled a pot of bean juice slowly, consumed into a pot of bottom hemp and ma za tie things, for the hemp tofu, with mutton fat, green beans, snow red fried a plate of fragrant hemp tofu, on the head and then a sting, pour some chili oil, in order to feed friends, this friendship is far stronger than the taste of the mountains and treasures of the sea. I often make a plate, eat a bowl of rice on weekdays, and when there is hemp tofu, at least double it, which shows the charm.
The places where bean juice is sold are generally cooked and cooked, and the big pot in the shop is always grunting with hot bean juice that is open, and the air is filled with its unique taste. To serve one or two bowls of bean juice, a small plate of spicy pickle shreds, two sets of scorched rings, after drinking, sweating profusely, the whole person from the inside to the outside is comfortable. After drinking, take the plastic bucket you carry with you and put a large bucket on it, and go home and boil it yourself. This is the scene of many elderly people in Beijing walking early now.
In the past, pickles on bean juice stalls were free, Mr. Wang Zengqi said such a thing, some people in Baoding Province asked the stall owner how much is bean juice on the bean juice stalls? The stall owner told him. He asked again about pickles? The stall owner replied that he did not want money, so the people in Baoding Province said, bring me a plate of pickles. As he spoke, he took out two steamed buns, and he took free pickles and was full. Nowadays, this kind of thing can no longer exist, and a few shredded pickles cost a dollar.
Chengde bean juice porridge
Looking around, in addition to Beijingers drinking bean juice, now Chengde, Hebei Province, can also find traces. Chengde is the location of the Manchu Rehe Palace, where the Manchu Mongols are numerous, and their diet is greatly influenced by Beijing. I once drank bean juice porridge in Chengde, that is, bean juice plus millet boiled into porridge, porridge also has noodles, lamb shreds and other things, some similar to Shaanxi, Henan peppery soup raw material ratio, but the taste is not so thick, the color is basically maintained in the original color. Served with pickled leeks, pickled celery and pie for breakfast.
Bean juice is suitable for all seasons, summer to relieve the heat, winter to withstand the cold, spring and autumn to drive away evil spirits. Today's bean juice is withering away like other snacks in old Beijing, and it is impossible to find a few places to drink bean juice all over the city.