Text/Moon Under Chan Juan
This is a dish that I love dearly. It comes from a famous city adjacent to my hometown, the hometown of the emperor and the hometown of longevity - Zhongxiang. Written records that the history of this city lasted for more than 2700 years, during the Spring and Autumn Warring States period it was the capital of the State of Chu, the late Warring States period was the capital of the State of Chu, the State of Wu built a stone city here during the Three Kingdoms period, the two Jin Dynasties to the Ming Dynasty for the county, prefecture, and prefecture, and the Ming Dynasty as one of the three major provinces in the country, the seat of Chengtianfu.
It has a long history, giving birth to the glorious Chu culture, and has "beautiful residence on Shicheng Lake, flower moon sheng song spring hate Yu." Alone on the platform against the prince, the evening wind and autumn water fell on the hibiscus. "Such a psalm repeatedly chants the song of mochou and mochou lake.
I have said so much, not to boast about the ancient city of Zhongxiang, which was given the name of the county by Emperor Jiajing of the Ming Dynasty. It is not my hometown, even if geographically it is only less than a hundred kilometers away from the small mountain village that gave birth to me.
The atmosphere and magic of the obvious mausoleum, the beautiful hundred islands of Mochou Lake, the water and sky, and the magnificent and magnificent waves of the Huangxian Cave are the fascinating places that Zhongxiang enjoys today. But there is only one dish that was born here that makes me remember it and cannot forget it.
This geographical gap of less than a hundred kilometers makes everyone in my hometown make this dish, everyone eats this dish, and everyone loves this dish. And like Zhong Xiangcheng, there is no feast without this dish.
Well, believe me, it's worthy of such a lengthy padding. It is the "Emperor's Dish", which is the top delicacy at the imperial banquet of the Ming Dynasty court, and it is also the "ZhongXiang Three Perfections" today, and its production skills are included in the "List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Hubei Province", and its own has also been included in the "Chinese Recipe".
Its name is panlong dish, also known as panlong dish, roll cut, chopped vegetables.
The noble-born and luxuriously used Panlong dish is carefully made with eggs, pork, fish, onion and ginger and the wisdom of the Zhongxiang people. A dish, "eat meat without meat", bright color, fat but not greasy, meat smooth and oily, long flavor.
The packed dragon dish is like a yellow dragon scroll cut into the plate, and the steaming heat is placed on the banquet like a real dragon, soaring through the clouds and driving the fog. Shiren has a poetry cloud: "The taste of mountains and treasures of the sea does not need to be offered, and the rich water and fragrant wine have a strong taste." The guests were full of guests and served the food, disguised as a roll-cut dragon. ”
In 1521, the thirty-one-year-old Emperor Mingwuzong Zhu Houzhao died and was childless, and Empress Zhang and the first assistant of the cabinet decided that Zhu Houxi, a cousin of Emperor Wuzong of The Near branch, would inherit the throne. This Zhu Houxi was Emperor Ming Shizong, the Jiajing Emperor who had a great relationship with the dragon dish.
At that time, Zhu Houxi was a young prince who was only fourteen years old, and the fief was today's Zhongxiang City, Hubei Province, leaving aside the fact that a delegation composed of the celebrant of ceremonies, the imperial family and the representatives of the imperial court in history went to the palace to welcome him to the capital to inherit the unification, not to mention, the people made an imaginative interpretation of the process of the young Zhu Wangye embarking on the road of the emperor.
Legend has it that after Emperor Wuzong's death, the empress dowager simultaneously sent back Zhu Houxi (朱厚熜) of Anlu Prefecture (安陸州, in present-day Zhongxiang, Hubei Province), Zhu Youyu (朱佑榰), the Shou King of De'an, and Zhu Youju (朱佑梈), the Ruding King of Weihui. These three princes, one in Cangzhou, Hebei, is only a few hundred miles away from the capital, one is in Nanjing, which is only more than a thousand miles, and Zhongxiang, the seat of our little Zhu Wangye Xing's palace, is more than three thousand miles away from the capital. The mountains and rivers are long and the waters are long, and along the way, they must also circle the farewell banquets of the high-ranking officials and nobles, and they must be more vigilant against the obstruction and assassination of competitors, and it is really difficult to seize the advanced capital.
However, Xiao Zhu, who did not abandon the throne and did not give up, under the clever plan of his courtiers, pretended to be a Qin prisoner, got into a prison cart, and rushed to the capital day and night. This saved a lot of trouble on the way, but Xiao Zhu was the son of the king of the clan, who had been pampered since childhood, lived a luxurious life, and was easy to take in the prison car, but it was really difficult to eat chaff dishes along the way. Not eating coarse grains, and afraid that passers-by will doubt their identity, Xiao Zhu, who was embarrassed, ordered the cook to make a dish that ate fish but did not see fish, and if he could not make it, he would be in danger of life.
Although the chef of the house, Zhan Duo, is highly skilled in cooking, but he can't make a dish that meets the requirements with all his brains. When night fell, the chef who could not cook sighed for a long time, and Jando's wife remembered her husband, so she brought steamed sweet potatoes to visit Jando. The irritable Zhan Duo was worried about the head of the item, where there was still the mood to eat steamed sweet potatoes, a fall broke the sweet potato skin, at that time Master Zhan had a flash of inspiration in his head, a famous dish that had been passed down in the court and the folk for more than four hundred years, and the dragon dish turned out to be born.
The fish meat is chopped into a puree and mixed with egg white, steamed and wrapped with sweet potato skin, this "simulated sweet potato" is delicious and not greasy, delicious and delicious, Xiao Zhu took the sweet potato to sit in the prison car, grabbed the capital to ascend to the throne of Jinluan and became the Jiajing Emperor.
Zhan Duo, who made simulated sweet potatoes, naturally continued to cook for the Jiajing Emperor in the capital, and the upgraded version of "fish minced into purees and mixed in egg white" no longer had to be wrapped in cooked sweet potato skins, but finely spread out and coated with beautiful colored egg skins. Such a wrapped strip of steamed bread-shaped food was first basketed and steamed on fire, and then it was cut into thin pieces by Master Zhan's skillful hands and buckled into a coiled Wolong shape at the bottom of the bowl, emitting its irresistible aroma twice in the gentle steam of the imperial kitchen, and along the way, when the buckle bowl was unveiled to officially show its true face of Lushan, it truly captured the heart of the True Dragon Heavenly Son, Emperor Jiajing, with its color and fragrance and auspicious and prosperous meaning. As a result, it was officially named "Dragon Dish".
Because it is a delicacy eaten by the True Dragon Tianzi who is entrenched in the prison cart, it is also known as "Panlong Dish". And because people are accustomed to rolling it in a vegetable dish and cutting it into pieces, it is commonly known as "roll cutting". As for the name chopped vegetables, it is because the fish meat is chopped and steamed to make it, plus the inventor is Jando, called "chopping vegetables" is taken from the harmonic sound of Zhanduo's "more" to commemorate this gourmet.
The authentic dragon dish is exquisitely selected, finely made and extremely exquisite.
The minced meat should be wrapped in gauze and rinsed in clean water until the blood color is gone. Then stir the minced meat and seasonings such as salt, starch, green onion and ginger. At this time, it is especially necessary to work hard, and it is said that you can only stir in one direction. I have eaten too many times of dragon cuisine, the same method, the same ingredients, different people cooked out, or different taste. Some people say that cooking is a matter of talent, such as soaking a pot of water-clear-skinned radish, and there is a world of difference in taste.
My hometown people, who are under the same person as the dragon cuisine of the imperial homeland, do not make this dish into an aristocratic pie in this way. It's very grounded. People in that small village call it roll cutting, and the roll cutting that is grounded is also a dish that is usually not easy to eat.
Towards the End of the Year, my mother put on her whitewashed apron, dug her own chives in the vegetable garden, and raised the good ginger in sand to prevent freezing. Father weighed sweet potato starch from the market town, mother cooked thin japonica rice porridge, minced pork, chives and ginger minced, sweet potato starch with water, mixed rice porridge, but also added eggs, I don't know how wonderful and just right the chemical reaction, the meat less rice noodles more ingredients were kneaded by the mother into a cylindrical shape, docile and pleasing lying in the steamer.
They are the same as other delicacies in the bamboo steamer, ribs, tamales, chicken and duck, lotus root, steamed buns... Together on the earthen stove, they are subjected to the steaming of firewood. In the gaze of my eyes, in my salivating waiting, in the steaming cries of the big iron pot, it became a hot and fragrant dragon. They are like the farmer's sincere cherishing of a well-off life, like the mother's solemn solemnity of the Spring Festival, like a happy ceremony, carefully placed on the board by a bar code. Then the mother took the bowl of red paint made of warm water, dipped it in gauze, and painted the bright and festive red from beginning to end.
Many years later, I stubbornly believed that there would be no better dish in the world than the dragon in my hometown. The simple fresh fragrance and mellow beauty rooted in the soil, the steaming indescribable warmth and the happy taste of tranquility.
They are with the bustling market town in a simple village tone at the end of the Waxing Moon shouting "Sell rolls cut red... Selling rolls cut red..." The old man was imprinted together in my childhood.
They are as imprinted in my youth as the candle shadows of the cold winter at the end of the year, the warm flames rising in the stove, the young waist of my mother in an apron, and the distant sky of the village, the silent earth, and the chicken crying that arrives in the dream world in the middle of the night.
I was the girl who grew up eating dragon vegetables in that small mountain village, and then left my hometown, left my mother, left it, simple fast food, the big pot of rice in the canteen, or the grand and beautiful but non-appetiteful meal at the banquet, which nourished my busy body in the city, but did not feed my hungry soul.
The poet Ai Qing said, "Why do I always have tears in my eyes?" Because I love this land deeply. "I was so eager to long for this dish that did not pass the whole country, several independent midnight nights, holding the phone, calling my mother, screaming and half-shaking, only to say that I was hungry and wanted to eat the dragon dish.
I miss it, I miss my mother, I miss that little mountain village.
It was a small mountain village less than a hundred kilometers away from the land of the emperor, where everyone loved dragon vegetables, and everyone could not live without dragon dishes for their whole lives.
Whether it is marriage and funeral, or birth, old age, illness and death, or the extreme heat and cold, spring, summer, autumn and winter, the first dish served must be the dragon. Uncovering the lid bowl, the delicacies lying on the dragon are flowing in the heat for more than four hundred years, like the mountains and rivers of my hometown, like my father and mother in my hometown, and like me, who are loud and gentle and drink the villagers who sell rolls and cut red.