First, the flavor is diverse. Because of the vastness of our country, the land is vast, the climate, products, customs and habits are different, for a long time, in the diet also formed many flavors. Our country has always had 'south rice and north noodles', the taste of 'south sweet, north salty, east sour, west spicy' points, mainly Bashu, Qilu, Huaiyang, Guangdong and Fujian four major flavors.
Second, the four seasons are different. All year round, according to the season and eat, is another major feature of Chinese cooking. Since ancient times, our country has been seasonal changes to seasoning, food, winter flavor mellow thick, light and cool in summer; winter stew stew simmering, summer more cold frozen.
Third, pay attention to beauty. Chinese cooking, not only exquisite technology, but also pay attention to the beauty of the dishes of the tradition, pay attention to the color of the food, aroma, taste, shape, the coordination of the device. The performance of the beauty of the dishes is multifaceted, whether it is a carrot, or a cabbage heart, can be carved out of a variety of shapes, unique, to achieve the color, aroma, taste, shape, the harmony of the United States, to give a person with a high degree of unity of the spirit and the material enjoyment of the special.
Fourth, focus on interest. China's culinary very early attention to taste interest, not only on the color, aroma and taste of the meal snacks have strict requirements, and their naming, taste of the way, the rhythm of the meal, entertainment interspersed with certain requirements. The name of the Chinese cuisine can be said to be out of the gods, elegance and vulgarity **** appreciation. The name of the dish both according to the main, auxiliary, seasonings and cooking methods of realistic naming, but also according to historical stories, myths and legends, celebrities, food interests, dish image to name, such as 'family blessing', 'generals across the bridge', 'lion's head', 'called chicken', 'Dragon and Phoenix', 'Hongmen Banquet', 'Dongpo meat' ......
Fifth, the combination of food and medicine. China's cooking technology, and health care has a close link, thousands of years ago there is 'medical food with the same source' and 'medicinal meals with the same function', the use of food raw materials of medicinal value, made into a variety of delicious dishes, to achieve the purpose of certain diseases prevention and treatment."
Ancient Chinese people also put special emphasis on eating and cosmic rhythms of coordination and synchronization, spring, summer, autumn and winter, the evening and the obscure to eat different nature of the food, and even processed and cooked food should be taken into account the seasons, climate and other factors. These ideas have been formed as early as pre-Qin, in the "Rituals - Order of the Moon" has a clear record, and oppose the reversal of the seasons, such as the spring "line summer" "line autumn" "line winter" will be Day disaster; of course, also opposed to the consumption of anti-seasonal food, Confucius said "do not eat from time to time", contains a two-fold meaning of a regular meal, the second is not to eat anti-seasonal food, and the contemporary sense of the opposite, some eat anti-seasonal food is for the sake of the broad. Western Han Dynasty, the palace began to use greenhouses to grow "green onions, leeks and vegetables," and the Western Jin Dynasty rich man Shi Chong's house also has a greenhouse. This kind of ideology that emphasizes adapting to the rhythms of the universe is indeed unique to the Chinese food culture. The only remnants of this consciousness to modern times are holiday food customs (Chinese medicine also has some, but has not been paid attention to).
The "yin and yang, five elements" theory is the world model set by traditional thought, and is also considered to be the law of the universe. As a human being is one of the "three talents", food is indispensable to human life, and the cooking of food must follow this law. Therefore, not only did they classify flavors into five, and produced the saying "five flavors" (in fact, there are more than five "flavors" that a person can feel, but two or three thousand years ago, it was not a small number to be able to distinguish five), but also cut the foot to fit the foot by putting a large number (which had already been recognized) of grains, livestock, and foodstuffs into the category of "five flavors". point) of grains, livestock, vegetables and fruits into the "five grains", "five meat", "five vegetables" and "five fruits" fixed pattern. "and fruits, respectively. This is absurd. What is even more surprising is that there is also the saying that "every drink nourishes yang qi; every food nourishes yin qi" ("Rites of Passage - Suburban Special Adoption"). And that only drink and food and the yin and yang of heaven and earth are harmonized with each other, so that they can "communicate with the gods", up to heaven, so as to achieve the effect of "unity of heaven and man". Therefore, when offering sacrifices to the heavens, it is necessary to strictly follow the theory of yin and yang and the five elements. This statement was later inherited by the Taoist religion, became a starting point for their dietary theory, such as eating food is to increase the body's yin gas, such as "grains full of body and can not benefit the life," "food gas life" and so on, to cultivate, to get the yang should try to eat less, the best! The best realm is not to eat, take the "grain" realm.
The beauty of harmony is the highest aesthetic ideal of traditional Chinese culture. "The center is also, the world's great base also; and also, the world's reach also. To the center and harmony, heaven is in the position, and all things are nurtured" ("Rituals - Zhongyong"). What is meant by "center"? It cannot be summarized simply by the word "middle". The word "middle" means just right, in accordance with the degree. It's kind of like the word "zhong" in the Henan dialect. "He" is also a culinary concept. There is a famous line in the ancient text Shangshu - Saying Life, "If you make a soup, only salt and plum", meaning that to make a good soup, the key is to mix the salty (salt) and sour (plum) flavors, which is an analogy for the rule of the country. In Zuo Zhuan, Yan Ying (the wise prime minister of Qi) also talked with Duke Jing of Qi about what is "and", pointing out that "and" is not "the same", and that it is necessary to establish a basis for the coordination of different opinions. Therefore, Chinese philosophers believed that everything in heaven and earth finds its place in the state of "harmony" in order to reproduce and develop. This aesthetic ideal is built on the harmony and unity between the individual and society, and between man and nature. This idea of realizing the "beauty of harmony" through tuning was inspired and influenced by ancient cooking practices and theories, which in turn influenced people's entire dietary life, especially for the pursuit of art living, living art of the ancient literati and scholars.
The opposite of "neutral" is extreme, extreme in cooking is not considered authentic, those "salty excess, spicy excess, sour excess" of food, although by some of the body in the abnormal state of the people's pursuit, but in the long run it is It is harmful to the body. The evils of extremism in social and political life are even more unspeakable.
As mentioned above, the dietary life of the Chinese people embodies the characteristics of traditional culture, although some of these characteristics are incomprehensible or unscientific to modern people (in recent centuries, the word "science" has become almost a religious belief in China, and it is only a yardstick for measuring right and wrong in all fields, while it cannot be questioned), but is it possible that the dietary life of the Chinese people is a good example of traditional culture? It has become almost a religious belief in China over the last hundred years, and is only a yardstick to measure right and wrong in all fields, but it cannot be questioned in itself), but is eating and drinking all that the word "science" can say? If we focus on "culture", then the study of Chinese food life is not only a necessary part of Chinese culture, but can even be a key to the study of Chinese culture.
At present, food culture is still a vague concept. Some researchers say in general, it includes what to eat, how to do, how to eat the three aspects of the problem; some researchers believe that dietary culture of the birth of six sciences, namely, cooking, food manufacturing, therapeutics, dietary folklore, dietary arts and culture, food manufacturing; some researchers also advocate the addition of dietary aesthetics, dietary business, dietary appliances and so on. Some researchers also advocate the addition of food aesthetics, food commerce, food utensils and so on. My understanding of food culture mainly refers to the relationship between food and people, people and the social significance it generates. Therefore, although I also discuss food, delicacies, food processing, cooking, dietary customs and even the eating environment, eating utensils, tableware and so on in The History of Chinese Dietary Culture, I have introduced and commented on the relationship between food and human beings and people and their social significance, and I have omitted most of the pure craftsmanship that has little to do with human beings, in addition to the introduction of the necessary knowledge, in order to highlight the material and spiritual benefits that dietary life has brought to people. The purpose of this book is to emphasize the material and spiritual enjoyment brought about by dietary life, and the deliberate pursuit of Chinese food culture in these two aspects.
China is a big country of catering culture, for a long time in a certain area due to the geographical environment, climate and material resources, cultural traditions and national customs and other factors, the formation of a certain degree of kinship inheritance relationship, dishes with similar flavors, high visibility, and for some of the masses of the local flavor of the famous genre called cuisine. Among them, Lu Cuisine, Sichuan Cuisine, Su Cuisine and Cantonese Cuisine, known as the "eight cuisines", plus Beijing Cuisine and Hubei Cuisine, that is, "ten cuisines".
The understanding of Yunnan cuisine is only limited to a few representative specialties such as "Bridge Rice Noodle" and "Gas Pot Chicken", but in fact, Yunnan cuisine is very rich, ranging from brightly colored flowers, hard bark, different styles of mushrooms, squirming insects, bright green leaves, and a lot of other foods, such as "Bamboo", "Bird's Nest", "Bird's Nest", and "Bamboo". The green leaves, the water in the long grass stems, fat wild fruits can be into the dish, so here in the culinary world, "a green is the dish, a move is the meat," said.
In fact, this is Yunnan's unique climate and rich plant and animal resources for Dian cuisine provides a wide range of raw materials, from 76 meters above sea level to 6,740 meters above sea level, the formation of the tropical, subtropical, temperate, frigid and other climatic types, for the 1.7 million species of plants and more than 10,000 kinds of insects to provide a growing environment. Coupled with 25 ethnic groups living here, living habits are not the same, the way to eat dishes and the choice of dishes are not the same. So foreign chefs think that Yunnan people cooking materials are not constrained, industry insiders believe that in this regard, any place in the country is incomparable, so the Yunnan cuisine ranked as China's ninth largest cuisine is not too much.