With its wild and delicious characteristics, the snail and the fish and crabs in the river form the "River Three Fresh", allowing people to taste the deliciousness of the river offering and enjoy the tip of the tongue.
Snail, in the Jiangnan water town is a common thing, where there is water, often present all year round, it is an aquatic animal with a spiral shell.
In the summer of my childhood, I would always go to the water's edge of the river port with my bare hands and familiarize myself with a large number of snails in my "secret base". When it was cool, the grandmother who shook the fan always asked me to guess the riddle. "Crooked pocket, roll door tower, miss out, fan cover". "What is raw is a bowl, what is cooked is a bowl, what is not eaten is a bowl, and it is still a bowl when eaten." These riddles, vivid images, made me unforgettable, because my grandmother, who was born by the water's edge, was very spiritual.
The snails I caught in my grandmother's hometown of Hebu were as verdant and transparent as a pagoda, rather than dark and rough, and the shell of the snails after eating was emerald green and translucent. Every time I went to the river port with my grandmother, who washed clothes and washed things, I could always catch a large number of snails up and down the stone strips in the water, and then raise them into the seven-stone water tank at home. At this time, Grandma would always drop a few drops of beloved sesame oil without hesitation, so that the snail slowly crawled, slightly opened and closed, and quietly spit it out. The next day, the snails are tightly attached to the walls of the water tank, like the iron nails on the wooden doors of large households. As soon as I stroked it with my hand, the snails would fall to the bottom of the cylinder. The clear water in the tank, which could originally reflect the shadow of a person, was suddenly turbid, and it took a while before it was restored to its original state by the snail that could absorb the sewage. Because in that era, ordinary people could not afford to buy condiments such as "MSG". Whenever Grandma stir-fried eggplant, cucumber and winter melon, she crushed, shelled, washed the snails, and sautéed them with vegetables to obtain endless umami. Sometimes, my grandmother would tell me to use a vise to remove the shell tail of the snail and fry a pot of scallion and ginger snails to make me full. Grandma said that fried snails are also a "meat" dish, and eating them can strengthen the body.
When I graduated from high school, I went to the countryside to join the team, and I continued my preference for snails. My favorite dish is stir-fried leeks with snail meat. The tender leeks in September and the deliciousness of the snail meat made me enjoy the gifts of nature to the fullest. After the meal, I lay in bed and read a book, allowing myself to have an inspired creation in the life of long (leek) thinking (worm).
If you want to improve your life, you just need to take the net you made and support it along the river, and the net mouth is next to the riverbed, and you can "catch up" with all your strength. A net, mud and grass, repeatedly washed in the water, and then poured on the shore to carefully pick up, not only snails, lucky, but also harvest small fish and shrimp salmon. This kind of fishing activity is an entertainment method for the boring life of my rural team.
In fact, like engaging in art, it must be practiced and skillful, but also rich in talent. Grandma eats snails, you can talk to me while talking to me in a eloquent manner, while using chopsticks to catch the snails, accurately send them to the mouth, "whoosh" twice, the snail meat will be sniffed in, and then gently "bald" a sound, the snail meat and tail, sharply separated, the whole action in one go, never drag mud with water. Under the tutelage of my grandmother, I also had the skill of sucking snails, neither need to use toothpicks or other auxiliaries, nor do I need to help with my fingers, just a pair of chopsticks, skillfully clamped into the mouth, with the tip of my tongue to provoke the thin cover of the snail mouth, "whoosh" twice, under the delicious juice surge, a lump of tough snail meat rolled to the tip of the tongue, and then, continue to the next snail.
Although the snails are delicious, they are of humble value. In the past, when entertaining guests, it was not possible to get on the table, and the literati and inkers never chanted poems into paintings. Nowadays, snail is not satisfied with its wild and delicious characteristics, but is not satisfied with appearing in the roadside stalls, but entering the table, and many hotels and liquor stores in Jiangnan can see its figure at any time. Even luxurious wine banquets are often served with snails, and it and the fish and crabs in the river form the "river three fresh", allowing people to taste the deliciousness of the river offerings and enjoy the tip of the tongue.
And Shanghainese people are symbolized by the small and beautiful snail, give full play to the flexible thinking of Jiangnan, make careful calculations, strive for excellence, and be proud of "doing a full dojo in the shell of the snail". We are engaged in the creation and innovation of "pursuing excellence" with taste. (Cao Weiming)