If you want to choose a food to represent Suzhou, there is only Su-style noodle soup. Suzhou proverb says, "Noodles should be soup, and bathing should be muddy soup." It means eating noodles before it's too late. The first pot of soup cooked by heart is the clearest and freshest. This shows how important the noodle soup in old Suzhou is.
For northerners, it is always felt that southerners who eat rice are not very cold about pasta, but for Suzhou, a land of plenty, this is a great misunderstanding. For a long time, Suzhou people who produce rice regard "eating noodles" as an important way of life and inheritance-grandpa takes his son to eat noodles, and his son takes his grandson to eat noodles, which is inherited in taste and habits. Until today, when you travel to Suzhou and see noodle restaurants with various "XX Xing" signs hanging all over the street, and the choice of dozens or even hundreds of noodles in noodle restaurants, you will know how deep the obsession of this city is.
First, the earliest dried noodles came from Suzhou.
Although there has always been a saying that "southerners eat rice and northerners eat noodles", Suzhou people have a special liking for a bowl of noodles here. The history of this bowl of noodles can be traced back to at least the early years of the Southern Song Dynasty.
According to the records of the Southern Song Dynasty Village: "After the suggestion (111130), there were many people from Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shanghai, Hunan, Fujian and Guangxi."
After the shame of Jingkang, Jin Bing invaded and forced the Song Dynasty to move south. The population of Jiangnan has increased dramatically, and large-scale population migration will inevitably bring about great changes in Jiangnan culture. Of course, the first thing is the change of three meals a day. With the arrival of a large number of northerners who eat noodles, the demand for flour has become unprecedented, so that in the early days of Shaoxing (1131-162), farmers benefited twice as much as seeds. At the same time, the government has also introduced an incentive policy: "tenants reduce rents and only accept autumn classes, and the income from wheat planting goes to the customer."
When so many northerners come here, the habit of "eating noodles" naturally comes, so there is a saying similar to "Wuxi steamed stuffed bun Suzhou noodles", which can be traced back to the Southern Song Dynasty.
At that time, all kinds of pasta were called cakes, and "Jing Kang Su Su Miscellanies" recorded: "Those who use noodles as utensils are called cakes: therefore, those who use fire as food are called sesame cakes; Eating in Chongqing is called soup cake; Those who eat in the cage are called steamed cakes. " Soup cake, also known as boiled cake, was in the transition period to noodles in Song Dynasty, and the cake after soup cake was the "ancestor" of noodles.
Since then, Suzhou people have long formed a new way of eating "strips for noodles" in addition to "the square is a cake, the circle is a ball, the flat is a cake, and the tip is a zongzi".
By the mid-Southern Song Dynasty, the earliest recorded dried noodles "Yao Qi Mian" was world-famous and was a specialty of Kunshan County, Pingjiangfu (Suzhou). In a book written by Feng Zhi in the 11th year of the Southern Song Dynasty (125 1), it was recorded as follows: "The medicine chess face is only one minute thin, as thin as paper, which can be eaten far away, although people and courtiers also contend for it." Noodles were dehydrated, preserved and easy to carry, and could be transported to Hangzhou, the then capital. Ordinary food has been improved into a gift, which has become a favorite gift of aristocratic bureaucrats, indicating that it also has the curative effect of health food. This is not only the contribution of Suzhou people to the development of pasta, but also a model of Suzhou people's meticulous diet.
Second, two or three hundred years of mastery.
But Suzhou grows rice after all. Can a short-term immigrant in a special era completely change the customs and habits of a region?
Of course not. The more important reason is the change of Suzhou's economic status since Ming and Qing Dynasties. This "small town in the south of the Yangtze River" in the Tang and Song Dynasties, with the changes of China's economic map, suddenly turned around and became the commercial center of southeast China.
For example, during the Hongzhi period of the Ming Dynasty, a North Korean official was shipwrecked and drifted to China. After being rescued by the Ming government, he went north to return to China along the Grand Canal. Later, he wrote "Wandering at Sea", including his "Suzhou Shengshi Ji". Cuipu is an important business district in Suzhou, which runs from Jinmen to Nagato and then to Qiao Feng through a first-line canal. Shortly after Cui Pu's trip, Tang Bohu also wrote the well-known "Nagato is a thing", which said: "The paradise on earth is Wuzhong, with Nagato, who is good at male; Cui Sleeve is 3,000 yuan upstairs and downstairs, and millions of dollars are in the west and east. He Jia of Wugeng City never said anything, and Siyao's words are always different; If a painter paints, the painter should know that painting is difficult. "
With the development of commerce, Suzhou has undergone a series of changes since the Ming Dynasty. Suzhou has become the economic center and population flow center in the south of the Yangtze River. Businessmen from all over the world gathered here, and the "permanent population" and "floating population" increased greatly, which activated the consumption of daily necessities in cities and the catering industry developed rapidly.
Then people from all over the country gathered, and businessmen accounted for a considerable proportion of the floating population in Suzhou. Businessmen from all over the world come here with goods from their hometown, from handicraft raw materials to food, clothing, housing and transportation, all kinds of needed goods. At that time, almost all industries were run by foreign businessmen. For example, the candle industry is mostly run by Shaoxing people, the coal shops are mostly run by Ningshao businessmen, the tobacco shops are mostly run by Henan and Fujian businessmen, Shanxi businessmen are mostly engaged in money industry, and Hunan businessmen are mostly engaged in grain industry. In the sauce shop, there are 86 gangs in Suning Shao. ...
In addition, various halls have sprung up. Suzhou Guild Hall was founded in Wanli period and reached its peak in Qianlong period, which fully reflected the growing prosperity of Suzhou industry and commerce. According to the statistics of inscriptions, the number of Suzhou guild halls increased to nearly 100 in Ming and Qing Dynasties.
With so many people gathered here from south to north, eating is of course a big problem. The taste of food is very important, especially in and around the guild hall, where the most distinctive food can often be found. This is just like the reason that Beijing gourmets always went to Beijing offices around the world to find food before canceling the Beijing office a few years ago. In other words, Suzhou, as the most important immigrant city in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, gradually merged the dialects and tastes of various places into this all-encompassing but distinct "Soviet-style noodles" in the process of integration for two or three hundred years.
Ganlong used to be the best promoter of Su-style noodles.
In the Suzhou Inscription Museum, there is a "Suzhou Noodle Restaurant Donation Inscription" in the 30th year of Guangxu (1904), which allows noodle restaurants to donate one for every thousand articles from their profits for public use.
There are 88 noodle restaurants that have been burned on the monument, and more than 30 people have donated One Happy and Fifty: Guan Zhengxing, Songhelou, Zheng Yuanting, Yi Changfu, Lu Zhengxing and Zhang Jinji ... Many of these names can still be seen on the streets of Suzhou. Of course, most of them are relatively large noodle restaurants, and it is estimated that many small noodle restaurants can't sit down.
Eating noodles has finally become the living standard of Suzhou people.
In fact, the influence of "Suzhou Bowl Noodles" was far more than that of Gusu.
In the 17th year of the Republic of China (1928), Hangzhou Customs Heritage recorded many old customs of Hangzhou during Daoguang and Tongzhi years. Under the entry of "Suzhou Pavilion", it is clearly written: "The noodles sold in Suzhou Pavilion are thin and soft. There are turkey, three delicacies, braised pork, mutton paomo, braised pork and so on. Each bowl is twenty-one, twenty-eight and thirty-four, but the whole plate of fried noodles is eighty-four, and snacks, wine, snacks and spring cakes are also sold. , are meat noodle restaurant. In particular, there is a vegetarian noodle shop that specializes in vegetarian soup and cauliflower noodles. The starting price is six or eight. For example, if you weigh more than one kilogram, use a copper pot called' copper pot noodles'. In April, you will sell spiced eel and two dishes of noodle soup. " This can at least show that as early as a few years ago, a bowl of noodles in Suzhou had already opened the market in Jiangnan.
Of course, the most important promotion ambassador in Suzhou is probably Emperor Qianlong, who listens to pingtan in a bookstore in Suzhou. You probably often hear him burp contentedly after eating a bowl of noodles. It is said that the famous "small stove noodles" are the result of misunderstanding between him and a good woman who is a little hard of hearing in Kunshan. The word "high bad" was originally Suzhou dialect, meaning "dirty and unclean". But Lord Qianlong just understood it as "the secret is in the stove" and became famous at once.
At the beginning of the article, the face of Fengqi Town is also the credit of Pingtan's eating goods. He came to Qiao Feng Town incognito, tired and hungry, and knocked on the door of a small noodle restaurant. Who knows this shopkeeper is a rotten gambler who has no intention to operate? There is nothing to eat in the shop. So, he grabbed the ingredients and spices at random and cooked them at random: without bone soup, he cooked the soup with the remaining eel bones, without wine to remove the fishy smell, temporarily grabbed the distiller's grains, without topping, picked up a piece of white meat that had not been salted and made a bowl of noodle soup. As a result, the son of heaven was praised unsurprisingly, so this bowl became famous in Qiao Feng Town in the future. Fortunately, it was not called "gambler's face".
But there are many anecdotes in Suzhou, and most of the stories are ordinary things in Suzhou. When the emperor met them by chance, he was shocked and praised them greatly. Is the emperor's old son too shallow-minded, or is the son of heaven unique in taste and high in status, and can find beauty that ordinary people can't? Suzhou people probably think it is the former: the emperor's old son is actually quite poor, and there is really nothing delicious in the forbidden area of the deep palace.
Of course, this confidence comes from the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Handicrafts from all walks of life in Suzhou bear the brunt of the trend, and the so-called Su Zuo is synonymous with exquisiteness and elegance. Suzhou noodles, as the Ming and Qing proverbs say, "Suzhou is like a craftsman in Guangzhou", want to be fine. In Stephen Chow's Gourmet, the phrase "A bowl of chowder rice should be cooked with heart" is really the most common requirement in a bowl of Suzhou noodles. Therefore, a bowl of Su-style noodle soup witnessed not only the changes of China's economic map, but also the epitome of Suzhou people's life and character: exquisite and restrained, unassuming, seemingly simple and ordinary, but actually profound.
Eat such a bowl of noodles, how can you not eat a lot of the true meaning of life!
Author: Yang Jining