a brief introduction to Hunan cuisine: Xiaoxiang flavor, represented by Hunan cuisine for short, is one of the eight major cuisines in China (Zhejiang cuisine, Jiangsu cuisine, Hunan cuisine, Sichuan cuisine, Fujian cuisine, Guangdong cuisine, Anhui cuisine and Shandong cuisine). Hunan Province is located in the south-central region, on the south bank of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River. The climate here is warm, with abundant rainfall and sunshine, and the four seasons are distinct. There is Hengshan Mountain in Nanyue in the south and Dongting Lake in the north. The four rivers of Hunan, Guizhou, Yuan and Li flow through the whole province. Rich natural conditions are conducive to the development of agriculture, animal husbandry, sideline production and fishing, so the products are particularly rich. Xiangbei is a famous Dongting Lake plain, which is rich in fish, shrimp and Xianglian, and is a famous land of fish and rice. It was recorded in Historical Records that Chu was "rich in terrain and free from hunger". For a long time, the proverb "the lake is wide and ripe, and the world is full" has been widely circulated. Southeast Hunan is hilly and basin, and agriculture, animal husbandry and by-products fishing are very developed. Xiangxi is mountainous and rich in bamboo shoots, mushrooms and delicacies. Rich products provide exquisite raw materials for diet. The famous specialties are: Wuling soft-shelled turtle, Junshan silver needle, Qiyang pen fish, Dongting scarab, Taoyuan chicken, Linwu duck, Wugang goose, Xianglian, whitebait and bamboo shoots, mushrooms and delicacies in the mountainous areas of western Hunan. In the long-term food culture and cooking practice, Hunan people have created a variety of dishes. According to textual research, as early as the Western Han Dynasty more than 2,111 years ago, Changsha could make various styles of delicacies with various raw materials such as animals, poultry and fish by cooking methods such as steaming, boiling, boiling and roasting. With the development of history and the continuous exchange of cooking techniques, Hunan cuisine with three local flavors, namely Xiangjiang River Basin, Dongting Lake Area and Xiangxi Mountain Area, has gradually formed.

Hunan cuisine is a local flavor dish with a long history in China. Xiangxi cuisine is good at being fragrant, sour and spicy, and has a strong mountain flavor. Hunan cuisine has a long history. As early as the Han Dynasty, it has formed a cuisine, and its cooking skills have reached a fairly high level. Hunan is located in central and southern China, with warm climate, abundant rainfall and superior natural conditions. Xiangxi is mountainous, rich in bamboo shoots, mushrooms and delicacies; Southeast Hunan is hilly and basin, with well-developed domestic animal husbandry and by-fishing; Northern Hunan is a famous Dongting Lake plain, known as the "land of plenty". In "Historical Records", it was recorded that Chu was "rich in terrain and free from hunger". [Edit this paragraph] Hunan cuisine history, located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, is one of the developed areas in ancient China with rich land, mild climate and superior natural conditions, with four waters of Hunan, capital, Yuan and Li running through the whole territory and pouring into Dongting Lake.

Based on a large number of exquisite pottery utensils and wine vessels unearthed from the Neolithic sites in Hunan Province, and the remains of grains and animal bones unearthed with these pottery, it is confirmed that Xiaoxiang ancestors broke away from the primitive state of eating animals and drinking blood as early as eight or nine thousand years ago and began to eat cooked food. During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, Hunan was mainly a place where Chu people and Yue people lived, with many nationalities living together, different food customs, and the wind of sacrifice prevailed. Explaining the Nine Songs, Wang Yi of Han Dynasty said: "In the past, between Wenyi and Yuanxiang in the south of Chu, people believed in ghosts and loved shrines, and their shrines were bound to make songs and music to inspire the gods ..." Every ritual activity was always accompanied by dances and music. Sacrificing to the gods, offering sacrifices to the land, enjoying ancestors, celebrating weddings, holding funerals, welcoming guests and seeing off guests all need to have dinner. There are strict requirements for the variety of dishes, and they are also very particular about color, fragrance, taste and shape. For example, in the Warring States period more than 311 years BC, the great poet Qu Yuan was exiled to Hunan and wrote the famous poem "Songs of the South". Among them, "Evocation of Soul" and "Big Trick" reflect the rich and delicious dishes, drinks and snacks in this sacrificial activity at that time. There is a description in "Evocation of Soul": "... eat more, the rice is covered with wheat, and the yellow beam is more." It's bitter and salty, and it's hard to do something. Fat cows are more fragrant. If you are bitter, Chen Wu will have some soup. The soft-shelled turtle shoots lamb, and it has some pulp. Sour fish, fry some red fish. It' s not pleasant to show the chicken. " Interpreted in vernacular, it is like this: "The dishes you eat are rich and colorful. You can eat rice, millet, glutinous rice, and Huangliang as you like. Sour, sweet, salty and bitter, harmonious and palatable. The beef tendon is soft and fragrant. Wu Guo soup with sour and bitter flavor. Roast turtle, roast lamb and sugar cane juice. Vinegar-cooked swans, braised pheasants, fried fat geese and cranes, as well as braised chicken and stewed turtle broth, are delicious and strong-they will last for a long time. " In addition, the Big Trick also mentions Chu cheese-Chu cheese, porpoise-pig meat sauce, bitter dog-dried dog meat, roasted crow, steamed pheasant and fried. From this, we can know that there were dozens of cooking methods such as burning, roasting, stewing, frying, boiling, steaming, stewing, vinegar cooking, halogen and sauce in the food life of Hunan ancestors at that time. The raw materials used are also natural resources with the color of Chu and Hunan. In addition, according to the records in Songs of the South, snacks at that time were also very distinctive. Qu Yuan described it this way: ".. there are some honey and erbium. Yaojiang honey spoon is more feather-like. If you drink it cold, it will be cooler. Chinese food is frozen, and there is some nectar .. "Interpreted as vernacular means:" There are fried honey glutinous rice Baba and steamed honey cakes, as well as caramel. The iced glutinous rice wine is really cool and mellow, and the jade yellow rice wine is enough for you to be intoxicated ... "All these indicate that as early as the Warring States period, the dietary life of Hunan ancestors was quite colorful and the cooking skills were quite mature, forming a southern flavor dominated by sour, salty, sweet and bitter. As for the daily staple food of Hunan ancestors during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, according to archaeological and historical data, there are rice, sorghum, beans, wheat, millet, millet and rice, but mainly rice. Steamed rice retort, pot, kettle, etc. Steamed rice is not sticky and sweet. When cooking porridge, use rice and water, put them in the porridge and cook with fire until the rice is cooked. After rice porridge is cooked and dishes are cooked, it must be served in containers to facilitate eating. At that time, Hunan food containers were not only complete in variety, but also exquisite and elegant. As far as materials are concerned, it mainly includes pottery, bronze, iron, lacquer and so on. Although these food containers have appeared since the Shang Dynasty, their shapes have their own characteristics in Hunan. In particular, thousands of lacquerware unearthed from Chu tombs in Changsha, Hunan, have beautiful shapes, bright colors and smooth patterns.

during the Qin and Han dynasties, Hunan's food culture gradually formed a relatively complete system in terms of materials, cooking methods and flavor styles, with its abundant raw materials, colorful cooking methods and delicious flavor. In 1972, it can be seen from the burial legacy unearthed from the tomb of Xin Zhui, the wife of a soft marquis in Mawangdui, Changsha City, Hunan Province, that there were nearly 111 kinds of fine dishes and delicacies in Hunan during the Western Han Dynasty more than 2,111 years ago. There are 24 species in 5 categories in meat soup alone. The one cooked with pure meat is called Taitang, which is the best soup. There are 9 kinds, all of which are thick soup. Clear soup cooked by stewing method is called white soup, which includes seven kinds: beef white soup, venison taro white soup, fresh mandarin fish lotus root abalone white soup, etc. The meat soup cooked with celery is called middle soup, and there are three kinds of soup: dog towel soup, goose towel soup and crucian carp and lotus root soup. The meat soup cooked with Artemisia is called every soup, including beef every soup, sheep every soup and tapir every soup; There are two kinds of meat soup cooked with bitter vegetables: dog soup and cow soup. There are also 72 kinds of food. For example, "fish skin" is the meat cut from the belly of raw fish; "Cattle fat" and "deer fat" are foods made by cutting raw meat into filaments; "Boiled rabbit" and "boiled quail" are dry-fried rabbits or quails.

It can be seen from the unearthed strategies of the Western Han Dynasty that the cooking methods in Hunan in the Han Dynasty have been further developed compared with those in the Warring States Period, and developed into many kinds, such as soup, roasting, frying, boiling, steaming, boiling, preserved, preserved, preserved, preserved, canned, fermented, preserved and so on. Seasonings used in cooking include salt, sauce, black beans, koji, sugar, honey, leek, plum, cinnamon, pepper and cornus. Because Hunan is rich in natural products, it is known as the "land of plenty", so since the Tang and Song Dynasties, especially during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the development of Hunan's food culture has become more perfect, and gradually formed a distinctive Hunan cuisine among the eight major cuisines in China. [Edit this paragraph] Food culture Generally speaking, Hunan food customs mainly have the following characteristics:

1. In Hunan, "eating" has rich social significance. First of all, in people's weddings and funerals, eating is always an important content. Marriage is called "eating wedding wine"; Dead people, commonly known as "eating meat"; If you add a population, you must eat a "full moon"; For your birthday, you should eat poached eggs and eat "birthday noodles". Secondly, "eating" is also one of people's important social means. When friends and acquaintances meet, the first greeting is often: "Have you eaten?" When you visit a friend's house, you can eat 11 or 12 dishes, which means that you have received the most enthusiastic hospitality from your host.

2. In Hunan, due to geographical and climatic reasons, rice is cultivated in most areas, and rice is the staple food in people's daily diet. However, in a few mountainous areas, especially in some places in the mountainous areas of northern Hunan, corn, sweet potato and potato can only be the staple food for planting dry food crops. In recent years, the economy of these areas has gradually developed, producing flue-cured tobacco or medicinal materials, which can be sold to the country in exchange for rice, so rice and corn have gradually become the staple food. Sweet potato and potato are gradually separated from staple food and become raw materials for making starchy food, brewing wine, sun-dried vegetables, etc. or feed for raising livestock. In Hunan, people eat three meals a day, whether in urban or rural areas. The difference is that in cities, breakfast is more casual, with the heaviest dinner in a day and the heaviest weekend diet in a week. In the countryside, there is no obvious difference between three meals a day. Every lunar festival or solar term, the diet is generally more grand than that in the city. Within a year, the diet around the Spring Festival is the most important. In addition, no matter in the city or the countryside, almost every household has to make some pickles, dried vegetables, pickles, preserved vegetables and preserved vegetables according to the seasons. Whenever a guest arrives, the table is always served to show the housewife's skills and housekeeping ability.

3, regardless of men and women, old and young, they are generally fond of spicy food. Whether it's three meals on weekdays, a banquet in a restaurant, or a drink between three friends and four friends, there must be one or two Chili dishes.

It is said that pepper originated in tropical South America and was introduced to China in the late Ming Dynasty. Hunan's geographical environment is called "lowly and wet land" in ancient times, which is rainy and humid. Pepper has the effect of keeping out cold and rheumatism; In addition, Hunan people eat rice as their staple food all year round, which can directly stimulate saliva secretion, stimulate appetite and stimulate appetite. When more people eat, they form a spicy custom. People in Hunan eat peppers in a variety of ways. Soak the red pepper in a sealed acid jar, and it is sour in the spicy, which is called "sour and spicy"; Combine red and spicy, pepper and garlic, which is called "spicy"; Chop the big red pepper and marinate it in a sealed jar, which is salty and spicy, so it is called "salty and spicy"; Chop the big red pepper, mix the dry rice powder and marinate it in a sealed jar. When eating, it can be dry-fried or mashed, which is called "spicy"; After crushing red pepper, add garlic seeds and fragrant black beans, and soak in tea oil, which has a strong fragrance and is called "oily and spicy"; Barbecue the big red pepper in the middle of the fire, then tear off the thin skin and mix it with sesame oil and soy sauce. It is spicy and sweet, which is called "fresh and spicy". In addition, dried and fresh peppers can also be used as cooking ingredients, and there are many ways to eat them. Especially in Miao Village, a Dong township in western Hunan, whenever guests arrive, they always use dried Chili stew to entertain them. When persuading guests, they always politely invite them to eat "Chili" again and again instead of "meat", which shows that they are very fond of spicy food. In recent years, Hunan cuisine has been popular with customers in Europe, America and Southeast Asia, especially in the United States and Canada. In the United States, in front of some Hunan restaurants, there is a sign painted with big red pepper, which reads Hunan pepper, and the apron of the waitress in the museum is also embroidered with big red pepper.

4. Hunan people love bitter taste. According to documents, its origin can be traced back to the pre-Qin period. There is a poem in "Chu Ci Evocation" that says "be bitter and salty, be sweet and do something". The "great bitterness" here is said to be lobster sauce. So this condiment made from beans has a history of more than 2111 years. Up to now, people in Hunan still have the habit of eating lobster sauce, such as "Liuyang fermented soya beans", which is one of the famous local specialties. Others, such as Bitter Claw and Tartary Buckwheat, are also popular among Hunan people. Bitterness not only has its historical origin, but also has its local characteristics. Hunan is located in the subtropical zone, with a long summer heat. Traditional Chinese medicine explains the meaning of summer heat: weather dominates heat, local gas dominates humidity, and humid heat is steamed, which is called summer heat; When people are in the midst of qi communication, they feel sick, which is summer sickness. And "bitterness can purge fire", "bitterness can dry dampness" and "bitterness can strengthen the stomach". Therefore, people eat some bitter food properly, which is helpful for clearing heat, removing dampness and regulating stomach, and is of great benefit to health care. Looking at the topography of Hunan, the northern part of Hunan is mostly a lake area, the southern part of Hunan is mostly a mountainous area, and the central part of Hunan is a typical hilly area. This geographical difference leads to the diversity of dietary customs in various parts of Hunan. We divide it into three wind-eating areas, namely, Xiangxi wind-eating area, central and southern Hunan wind-eating area and northern Hunan wind-eating area. [Edit this paragraph] The characteristics of Hunan cuisine The cuisine in Xiangjiang River Basin is centered on Changsha, Hengyang and Xiangtan, and is the main representative of Hunan cuisine. It has fine production, extensive materials, varied tastes and various varieties. Its characteristics are: strong oil color, emphasis on practical benefits, and emphasis on sour and spicy taste, fragrant and fresh, soft and tender. In the preparation method, it is known as simmering, stewing, waxing, steaming and frying. Simmer and stew pay attention to cooking with low fire, simmer with thick juice and stew with clear soup like a mirror; The method of making bacon includes smoking, marinating and barbecued pork. The famous Hunan bacon is a smoked product, which can be served as cold dish, hot fried or steamed with high-quality original soup. Stir-frying is fresh, tender, fragrant and spicy, which is well known in the market. The famous representative dishes are: Steamed Sea Cucumber in Pot, Steamed with Bacon, Braised Meat in fermented soya beans with Oil, Spicy Chicken, etc. All of them are famous dishes and delicacies.

The dishes in Dongting Lake area are good at cooking seafood, poultry and family stories, and are often cooked by stewing, roasting and waxing, which is characterized by being thick, salty, spicy and soft. Stews are often served in hot pot, while folks use steaming bowls to stew on mud stoves, commonly known as steaming bowls stoves. It is often cooked while eating, and it is hot and tender, with relish. There is a folk song in the local area that "I don't want to go to the DPRK, just steam the pot and the stove", which fully shows that the stew is widely loved by the people. Representative dishes are: Golden Tortoise in Dongting Lake, Braised Mandarin Fish in Dongting Lake with Net Oil, Butterfly Floating in the Sea, and Rock Sugar Xianglian, all of which are well-known dishes in Dongting Lake area.

Xiangxi cuisine is good at making delicacies, smoked bacon and all kinds of cured meat, with a strong flavor of mountains and countryside, and its taste is salty, sweet and sour, and it often uses firewood as fuel. Representative dishes are: braised cold bacteria, boiled chestnut heart, Xiangxi sour meat and fried blood duck, all of which are well-known delicacies in Xiangxi.

Looking at Hunan cuisine, the same flavor is spicy food and preserved food. Chaotian pepper, which is famous for its strong spicy taste, is produced all over the province and is the main raw material for making spicy dishes. The production of bacon has a long history, which has been handed down in China for more than two thousand years. The cuisines in the three regions have their own characteristics, but they are not completely different. Instead, they share similarities and differences, see similarities in differences, depend on each other and communicate with each other. Looking at the whole picture, the knife work is exquisite, the shape and taste are beautiful, the seasoning is changeable, the sour and spicy are famous, the original juice is emphasized, and the techniques are diverse, especially the simmering. With the progress of the times and the development of the national economy, Hunan cuisine, a wonderful flower, will bloom more brightly.

In April, 1958, Mao Zedong and other central leaders inspected Changsha Huogong Restaurant and tasted its famous dishes, which were highly praised. The main famous dishes of Hunan cuisine are Dong 'anzi Chicken, Braised Shark's Fin in Red, Steamed with Bacon, Whole Duck with Bread, Spicy Winter Bamboo Shoots, Stewed Chestnut, Five-yuan Fairy Chicken and Jishou Sour Meat. Among them, "braised shark's fin in red", also known as "Zuan shark's fin", is a famous local dish in Hunan. The cooking method is to use shark's fin, chicken soup, soy sauce, etc., and simmer it with low fire. The juice is thick and delicious, and it is famous for its freshness and softness. During the Guangxu period of Qing Dynasty, Jinshi Tan Zuan liked this dish very much, so his chef improved the method of braised shark's fin in yellow, and cooked chicken, pork belly and shark's fin together, making the shark's fin softer, waxy and smooth, and the soup more mellow and delicious. Tan Jinshi was praised for his food and became famous all over the world. therefore