"Ten thousand pieces of sake in gold bottles, ten thousand dollars in jade plates," this is Li Bai's poem, which refers to the famous wine in the golden cup, and the price of each bucket is ten thousand. The poetry immortal Li Bai is also known as the wine fairy, he does not hesitate to express his love for fine wine in his poems, not only Li Bai, but also many literati in history have bluntly expressed their love for fine wine.
The wine culture of the Chinese nation has a long history, and the four famous works have made a strong and colorful narrative of wine, such as "Wenjiu Chopping Huaxiong" and "Cooking Wine Hero" in "Romance of the Three Kingdoms"; "Shi Xiangyun Drunken Lying Peony Medicine Garden" in "Dream of the Red Chamber"; "Lu Zhi deeply drunk and haunting Wutai Mountain" in "Water Margin"; and "Monkey King Drunken haunting the Heavenly Palace" in "Journey to the West".
Even more in film and television dramas, since we were children, we will imitate costume dramas and say: "Little two, come to the pot of good wine", and there must be wine on the party wine table. Different from now, the ancients drank mostly warm wine, that is, they used to heat up the wine before drinking, what is the reason?
In ancient times, people believed that drinking alcohol was a suitable method for all ages and could be used to maintain physical health, and they followed three principles for drinking alcohol.
Although the wine is good, don't covet the cup
First of all, don't drink too much. The ancients paid great attention to appearance, even if they drank wine, they also hoped to be able to consciously control themselves to ensure that they would not lose their words and manners.
"Three lords" is the ancient men must follow the etiquette of drinking, that is, the meaning of three glasses of wine, gentlemen drink only three cups, after drinking three glasses of wine, should be very conscious to put down the wine glass, leave the wine feast, three glasses of wine is the right amount, the right amount is enough.
Never drink alcohol on an empty stomach
Second, don't drink alcohol on an empty stomach. There is an old Chinese saying that when you are empty or angry, do not drink alcohol, because after the wine enters the human body, it will be decomposed by the liver, and the liver needs a variety of nutrients to help break down alcohol. If there is no food in the stomach and intestines at this time, it is easy to cause texture disorders and liver damage.
Do not mix with different liquors
The last point is not to mix and drink. Many people know that mixing alcohol will produce new harmful compounds, resulting in stomach discomfort, headaches, etc., and it is easy to fall into diarrhea, which is very harmful to the body.
Ancient wine is different from modern times, not the liquor we are familiar with, at that time most of it was "rice wine", the degree of wine is much lower than the current liquor, ancient winemaking technology is not perfect, there was no advanced "distillation" winemaking technology at that time.
In ancient times, wine was filtered from fermenting farm grains or other sugary ingredients, and due to the limitations of the filtration method, many grain impurities still remained in the wine, known as "turbid wine" and "rice wine".
If the filtration process is higher, the cleaner and brighter the filtered liquid becomes, which is called "sake". Although most of the visible impurities in sake have been filtered out, there are still many impurities left in the sake.
More importantly, many of the raw materials of winemaking will cause damage to human health, such as methanol, acetaldehyde and other harmful substances, which also have a great adverse impact on health after drinking. These adverse effects cannot be immediately manifested, but the impurities in these wines destroy the taste of the ancients, which is immediate.
They found that when the wine is heated to a certain temperature, the unpleasant smell in the wine disappears, because when the wine is heated, the formaldehyde and acetaldehyde and other substances in it will evaporate, the taste will become soft, and then the wine can be drunk without problems, so warm wine has become a very important drinking procedure before drinking in ancient times.
In summary, the behavior of warm wine in ancient times is inseparable from the level of winemaking technology at that time.
The winemaking process of the ancients was in its infancy, without modern precision instruments and techniques, and the wine of that time was far from the quality of today's wine. They did not know the process of distillation, did not know how to quickly evaporate water and methanol, and could only make a sealed porcelain altar to hold the wine.
Most of the ancient people drank rice wine, poor filtration, low degree of rice wine, mellow taste, but generally relatively rough, can not be called real liquor.
However, today's liquor does not need to be heated, modern people have advanced brewing technology, the main ingredient of liquor is mainly ethanol, ethanol boiling point is lower than water, the taste is softer. If we go to the extra mile to put it in hot water, it is easy to lose this mellow taste.
As we all know, the ancients attached no less importance to health and physical health than modern people, perhaps the times are backward, medical treatment is not developed enough, modern painless small diseases and small pains at that time, can be fatal existence, so for the usual diet is very careful, drinking wine is mostly drinking warm wine.
Drinking warm wine is also out of the importance of their own health, which is the same as the unique health concept of the Chinese nation, just like in modern times, we often say that we drink more hot water.
At that time, people regarded liquor as a cold thing, and if it was drunk directly, it would damage the liver, so the ancients had to heat the wine once before they could drink it.
For example, in the classic scene in "Dream of the Red Chamber", this scene is Jia Baoyu planning to drink, and Bao Chao advises Baoyu with kind words:
"Don't you know that wine is the hottest, and if you want to eat it hot, you can spread it quickly, and if you want to eat it cold, you will condense it inside, and warm it with your internal organs, won't you be harmed?"
The words were full of concerns about the tepid drinking.
Lu Rong during the Ming Dynasty also recorded his illness and seeking medical treatment in the "Miscellaneous Records of Shugu" written by him.
It is learned that "hot wine can hurt the lungs, but most of the work of qi and blood is done; cold wine is harmless to the lungs, and the stomach is cold, and drinking more will cause Lang to stagnate his qi." ”
The ancients attached great importance to good health, wine is considered a cold thing, if you drink directly, it will make your throat warm, it will also affect the internal organs.
Therefore, in the society at that time, it was believed that warm wine not only did not hurt the internal organs, spleen and stomach, but also played a role in strengthening the body. Moreover, because of the volatilization of warm wine, the aroma of the wine is vividly emitted, and people can taste its soft and sweet taste.
Warming up the wine before drinking wine has a special effect on the cold and curing diseases in the eyes of the ancients.
In ancient times, whether it is clothing or house bedding in all aspects of the warmth is not as good as now, so the ancients in the cold winter, used to heat the wine first and then drink, hot wine into the throat, so that you can make the body warm up, conditional can also put rice wine, ginger, green onions and brown sugar together to boil hot and drink, not only has the effect of cold, but also can prevent the invasion of cold, cold, cough and disease.
Wine and wine rely on taste to conquer the drinker, the ancient wine degree is very low, does not show the same rich wine aroma as modern wine, so people in order to smell the aroma of wine, used to heat the wine, increase the taste of the tongue and taste enjoyment.
Because it is often necessary to warm wine, there is a special wine vessel that has been invented to warm wine, that is, a wine warmer, and since the Shang Zhou Period, there have been records of wine warmers in the history books.
For the warmth of the wine, the ancients also have a lot of thinking and efforts, not only from the collocation of the wine glass, but also from the collocation of the stove cup, the collocation of the bowl and the cup, the collocation of the set of cups, it can be said that there are many tricks, but in the end it is collectively called the warm wine pot or the warm wine glass.
Due to the regional climate, the drinking habits of the south and the north during the Three Kingdoms period were different. Southerners like to drink wine from the most elegant and interesting cups, while in the cold north, people prefer to use copper bottles to heat wine.
As Cao Zhi's poem "Seven Revelations" describes: "Flourish with a green bottle, and carve it at your own expense." Floating ants boiling, hot and fragrant".
Among the more famous wine warmers are the warm wine bowls produced by the Song Dynasty to heat wine, which use a large bowl of hot water to warm the wine in the bowl and are quite popular.
There is also a kind of "warm pot", which is made of tin, which can hold half a pound of wine, and when going out in the cold winter, you can put the wine pot in your arms to maintain the temperature of the wine.
There is also a vessel of wine, shaped like a plate, in the middle of a small cup, with three fulcrums, when using wine to a small glass, lighting, and then warming the wine products of the wine, but this product can only be used distilled wine.
In the ancient north, there was also a kind of warm wine jug, like a samovar, which had an empty shaft stove, just pour wine around it. After the Tang and Song dynasties, the mainstream of wine vessels was ceramics, popular pots, cups, folk called hot wine jugs, hot wine glasses.
During the Ming and Qing dynasties, the wine warmer changed every day, and the shape and system were also different, including warm bowls, warm wine jugs, warm wine stoves, and warm wine jugs. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the People's Republic, the warm wine cup produced in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Is also very unique, with a coat, outer cup and outer lid, suitable for slow tasting.
Literati of various dynasties have mentioned wine vessels in their poems, the most popular of which is the Tang Dynasty poet Bai Juyi's "Ask Liu Xijiu": "Green ant new wine, red clay small stove." "On a cold winter night, take a small stove of red mud, charcoal, and wine and put it on a small pot to burn the fire, which can not only keep warm, but also drive away the cold and hot wine.
The popularity of wine warmers has made warm wine an indispensable habit in the daily life of the ancients.
Today, wine culture in China's long-standing traditional food culture icing on the cake, wine is one of the oldest foods in human society, almost from the beginning of human society, wine will develop, wine is a highly civilized human society of material culture, wine has a variety of forms, its development process and economic development history is closely related.
However, it is not only a kind of food, but also has spiritual and cultural value, as a product of a highly civilized society, the spiritual culture of wine is embodied in many aspects such as mass life, literature and art, people's lifestyles and rules of exchange.
Warm wine is not only the inheritance of food culture in China's thousands of years of history, but also a way of life for literati to cultivate sentiments, in this sense, drinking is not only drinking, but also drinking culture.
bibliography:
Miscellaneous Tales of Shugu