For dinner, the canteen served a pot of Guyuan characteristic raw noodles and ate two bowls in a row. A seemingly simple bowl of noodle soup with a few meatballs, diced tomatoes, vermicelli and spinach, etc., but it tastes delicious. This raw noodles eaten in Guyuan evoked a complex and memory for me.
In the early 1990s, I rode in a large truck relocated by the 217th Brigade of the Northwest Geological Survey Bureau of the Nuclear Industry, bumping all the way from Longnan, Gansu Province, and over the rugged Liupan Mountain with snowflakes overnight into Guyuan, Ningxia, which happened to be New Year's Day.
In a groggy state, the "Duodang" car stopped suddenly, startling me to sit up straight and shrink in the passenger seat, and the driver master said in a hoarse and thick Sichuan accent: "The three battalions have arrived, get out of the car and eat a bowl of hot and fragrant raw noodles." "I don't know where the three battalions are, what kind of noodles are raw noodles, rubbing tired eyes, using the afterglow of the truck's headlights that have not been extinguished, subconsciously looking at the watch, the time is nearly five o'clock in the morning." I exhaled a long breath and replied, "Finally down the hill." "Jump out of the car, the movement of the numb legs and feet, only to notice that along the side of the road has been parked a lot of large and small cars, trucks mostly." There are several restaurants on the side of the road, and the lights in the restaurants illuminate the surrounding dark night through the misty glass windows. It seems that this is where long-distance drivers can stay and eat and rest. Ask master Sichuan and learn that we have entered the town of Sanying in Guyuan, Ningxia.
Following master Sichuan, he pushed open a halal noodle restaurant, where many people ate. There are those who sit around the table and those who stand around the stove. Sitting around the table, a large bowl of noodles in front of each person, sullen to eat, making a sucking sound, a few heads of garlic scattered on the dining table, eating from time to time a mouthful of garlic in their hands. Standing around the stove, warming and chatting, waiting for food and waiting for empty seats. After entering the door we walked to the fire. I noticed that the restaurant environment is average, but it is very warm and lively, which makes the night walker feel like home. People who eat are very attentive and do not speak, only the sound of sucking and chewing. I just came in from the outside, and my voice was like a throttle, rushing and loud. Those who are in a hurry, keep urging to eat. Dressed as a Hui, the lady boss stood at the cashier of the restaurant and asked the night visitors, "What to eat?" "People wrapped in a cold air entering the door report" raw noodles. "Listening from the accent of one question and one answer, it is a bit like my old family, which sounds very kind to me, like returning to my hometown." When we entered the door, the lady boss asked the same question, "What to eat?" The answer to the boss lady's question was the Sichuan accent "raw noodles", and the Sichuan master's answer made the whole hall laugh. I thought that if I answered "raw noodles", I would make sure that the tone of my voice was not far from what everyone said, and no one would laugh. Looking around, I saw someone with a satisfied grease mouth after eating the noodles, guessing that the man was about to get up, and hurriedly moved closer to the table that was about to be moved. Before and after less than half a cigarette, two bowls of hot noodles were served in front of my table with The Sichuan master, cold and hungry, coupled with the temptation of wafting rice aroma, I couldn't wait to pick up the bowl and take a sip of soup, fragrant! I don't know what other language can be used to describe the taste of this soup at that time! I seem to understand that the night visitors are bored to eat and make sucking sounds because of the aroma of rice, because they are hungry. Later, I really understood that the sucking sound was not entirely because of the smell of rice and hunger, but also because of a complex. In the cold dark night of winter, in the long-distance travel, in that era of not being rich, you can eat a big bowl of lamb balls and tomato soup stewed noodles, it will really be fragrant!
"Come and come, spoon the oil and sprinkle the spicy seeds, and incense you boy!" Master Sichuan said as he added a spoonful of oil to my bowl. On the bright white and powerful noodles, a layer of shiny spicy oil is floating, not to mention the taste, just in terms of appearance, it makes people have an appetite and salivate. I grabbed a meatball and put it in my mouth and chewed open the crispy, greasy, full-throated meaty flavor. Take another sip of the soup, and sure enough, the taste is stronger. All of a sudden, I had no reticence, and I couldn't take care of the hot rice, even eating and drinking, a bowl of noodles quickly went down, my body was hot, the chill dissipated, and I was tired. This bowl of raw noodles is very strong, a bowl cost more than two yuan, after eating and driving for more than ten hours to reach Yinchuan, do not feel hungry. Since then, The town of Sanying in Guyuan has been deeply imprinted in my mind, only because of a bowl of raw noodles in the winter dark night of New Year's Day in 1990.
Later, it was learned that at that time, from Guyuan to Yinchuan, you had to pass through three camps, and the three camps were a transportation hub. Many transport drivers like to run sports cars at night, but they prefer to stop for dinner in Guyuan Sanying Town, so that they can eat the bowl of authentic raw noodles. Raw noodles were invented by Master Ma Dengyuan, a Hui old man in the three camps of Guyuan. In the 80s of last century, Master Ma opened a halal restaurant in Sanying Town, because the food in the restaurant had no specialties and the business was dismal, Master Ma investigated the market and reflected, and made up his mind to make a special meal, raw noodles came out in his constant exploration and improvement and asked customers for advice, the taste and quality of raw noodles ushered in many repeat customers, and were gradually spread by diners in the north and south, especially long-distance drivers, and became local specialty foods.
Since passing by the three camps in Guyuan that year, I have never eaten the three camps of raw noodles. The raw noodle restaurant opened in Yinchuan. When I first arrived in Yinchuan for two years, I was single for a long time, and I often went to the Ningxia Institute of Education to find Teacher Wang Jianguo to learn vocal music, and sometimes Teacher Wang greeted me to eat bowls of raw noodles in the front hall of the college gate, continuing my complex and memory of Guyuan Sanying Sheng noodles.
After starting a family, his life was stable, he was busy working with children, and his memory of raw noodles faded away. My mother came to Yinchuan to see her granddaughter live for ten days, and she forgot to take her mother to eat a bowl of raw noodles, which became my lifelong regret.
After my mother left, I took my father to Yinchuan. My father would make pasta, which was very muscular and chewy. My father likes to eat noodles, Yinchuan Xinhua Street's lamb noodles, Qinghe Street's cheek noodles, Funing Street's lamb noodles, Zhongshan Street's green noodles, Yongkang Lane's chicken mushroom noodles, Wuzhong ramen, my father has eaten, but I did not find my father's special praise mark. Only in the Tongxin Spring Restaurant to eat raw noodles, the father chewed slowly, the soup was clean, smacked his mouth, and gave a thumbs up and praise!
After the year of destiny, I will think of the taste on the tip of my tongue in my hometown from time to time, the handmade noodles made by my father, the bowl of raw noodles in the three camps, and the fragrance that cannot be described in words! In fact, it is "local taste", the taste of hometown.
Thinking back to my father's expression and appreciation when he ate the bowl of raw noodles at the Tongxin Spring Restaurant before he died, he must have eaten the "taste of hometown".
Nowadays, there are more and more noodle restaurants, and after being away from home for too long, without my father, I can no longer suck the "local flavor" of raw noodles.
About the author: Horse Racing, formerly known as Ma Fujian, loves literature and art, and his works are commonly found on the Internet and newspapers.