July is the highest temperature season in Jiangsu Province, but compared with this high temperature, the crayfish eaters in Jinhu County Square seem to be more enthusiastic.
Reporter: "Specially to eat lobster?"
Customer: "That's right."
Customer: "There is nothing to eat."
Customer: "I'll be home at 7: 00 tonight, and I'll be back for dinner at 7: 30."
In mid-July, it just happened to catch up with the food festival held in Jinhu County, Jiangsu Province, and the protagonists of the food festival were these crayfish. Most of these people in the square come from other places to eat crayfish.
Now almost every restaurant in Jinhu County takes crayfish as its specialty, and the daily demand for crayfish has reached 10,000 Jin. Jinhu has also become a famous crayfish producing area in East China.
Jinhu county is in the middle of Jiangsu province, next to Xuyi, and is famous for lobster. Xuyi lobster has been famous since the late 1990s. At that time, Jinhu mainly sold live lobsters to Xuyi.
Tao Guanghui, secretary of Jinhu County Party Committee: "It should be said that the popularity of Xuyi lobster has been greatly improved by holding the lobster festival, so it is reasonable and inevitable for us to export Xuyi lobster."
It was not until 200 1 that Jinhu had its first restaurant specializing in lobster. The owner of this restaurant is Zhang Taiming. Zhang Taiming used to specialize in lobster trafficking. At that time, there was a great demand for lobster in Xuyi, so Zhang Taiming often sent it to Xuyi by car. After a while, he found that the profit of opening a lobster restaurant was much higher than that of selling lobsters.
Zhang Taiming: "When selling lobsters, the maximum profit is between 50 cents and 1 yuan. Now the profit of burning lobster can be around 3 yuan, which is several times the difference. "
After finding out the details of opening a lobster restaurant, Zhang Taiming gave up the lobster trafficking business and returned to Jinhu to open the first lobster restaurant in the county. However, because Jinhu and Xuyi are too close, and Xuyi's 13 sweet lobster is already very famous, if I still make 13 sweet lobster, I am definitely not as competitive as Xuyi. At this time, he thought of a way to cook lobster in his hometown in the countryside.
Zhang Taiming: "For example, the lobster in Jinhu, I know lobster too well. The standard is traditional practice. How about traditional practices? Traditionally, our traditional practice is salted lobster. "
Boiling lobster in salt water is a relatively light way to eat, which can keep the delicacy of lobster. People who come here to eat lobster are mainly from Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces. People in this field have a weak taste, so Zhang Taiming thinks this practice may be more acceptable to guests. Moreover, this practice can give full play to the advantages of Jinhu lobster.
There are three lakes in Jinhu, which are mostly used by local farmers to raise lobsters. Lobsters raised in the lake are also very different from those raised in ordinary ponds.
Farmer: "Like the shrimp in this lake, the shell is green, the bottom plate is not dirty, like the bottom plate is clean, like the shrimp raised in this pond, like the shrimp raised in this pond, are you black compared with this shrimp?" There can be comparisons. "
Lobsters raised in the lake are of good quality. First of all, they have the conditions to make brine lobster, which can make Jinhu lobster different from Xuyi lobster and avoid repeated competition. So Zhang Taiming began to introduce brine lobster.
Zhang Taiming: "This mainly reflects the good quality of this lobster in Jinhu, a water town. If you look at the whiteboard, the lobster with poor quality should be black, and the board is not white. You can see at a glance that the guests have no taste. "
As soon as this dish was introduced in the restaurant, it quickly attracted many local guests to eat. Subsequently, Jinhu County opened dozens of restaurants mainly selling crayfish.
Because Jinhu and Xuyi are adjacent counties, before the expressway from Nanjing to Xuyi was built in 2006, guests who went to Xuyi to eat lobster would pass by Jinhu. In order to attract guests, lobster shops in Jinhu are all located beside the road, or billboards are hung on the road to attract more foreigners to eat lobster.
Customer: "The Plaza Food Festival is very lively for everyone. With children and friends, on the one hand, join in the fun, on the other hand, look at us and taste our food. "
In the past two years, the owner of the lobster shop thought that the Lotus Festival would be held in the county every summer. During this period, many foreign tourists will come to see lotus flowers and eat farmhouse dishes. This is a good opportunity to promote baked lobster with salt, and many lobster shop owners are ready during the Lotus Festival.
Gao Yongqi, the owner of the restaurant, said: "If a table of guests comes today, they will say that the lobster here tastes good after eating it. Is that how he promoted it? "
The Lotus Festival is held once a year, and the promotion of crayfish is getting stronger every year. May, June and July are the peak seasons for crayfish. In this season, Jinhu County can consume tens of thousands of pounds of lobsters every day.
Shi Zan is a lobster broker who has been engaged in lobster trafficking business for more than ten years. Every day, more than 6,000 Jin of lobsters are delivered through his hands. Previously, he didn't expect a small county like Jinhu to sell so many lobsters.
Shi Zan: "Lobster has always been important from other places in recent years, and we locals don't like it. Through these years, people here eat much more than foreigners. "
In the past, Shizan bought a lot of lobsters every June and then supplied them to Xuyi Lobster Festival. In the past two years, the local consumption of lobsters has increased, and the requirements for lobster quality are also high. Shi Zan, who has been doing lobster business for many years, knows that this is another good time to sell lobsters. He has changed his strategy of selling mainly overseas and started to supply mainly local products.
Shi Zan: "It depends on our side. If we need a lot of sales here, we usually don't go there. If there is a shortage there, we can give some, because there are more people eating here, so will people from outside and people from big cities. There is little sales here, so the demand is in short supply.
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When foreigners come to Jinhu to eat lobster, they always say that the lobster here is big and delicious. But Jinhu is far from Shanghai, Nanjing and other surrounding cities. It takes four or five hours to go back and forth, and eating lobster is not so convenient.
By 2005, more and more guests told Zhang Taiming that it was not easy to eat his lobster. At this time, Zhang Taiming saw many people selling things online, so he thought of selling cooked salted lobster online.
Zhang Taiming: "Online sales, only cooked, when online sales, if you need to send lobsters, we will send them."
Zhang Taiming's guests are all from Jiangsu and Shanghai, so the transportation distance is very concentrated, not very far, so Zhang Taiming specially prepared a transport vehicle to deliver salted lobster to customers in Jiangsu and Shanghai. However, in order to distribute lobsters uniformly, Zhang Taiming asked the guests who were going to buy lobsters to place an order one day in advance.
Zhang Taiming: "If a customer from Nanjing comes, call to order lobster. If there are many cars in Nanjing, they will be delivered to his door every day."
However, in order to ensure the quality and taste of the transported salted shrimp, Zhang Taiming put various seasonings in the packaged lobster, so that guests can adjust the salted shrimp that suits them according to their own tastes.
Zhang Taiming: "What about this packaged lobster? Plastic bags contain halogen. Just heat the marinade at home Do not heat the lobster. Don't burn it. Just heat the marinade and pour it on the lobster. " This packaging bag is all pollution-free, all processed. "
In the past two years, crayfish have become more and more popular, and more and more people order lobsters online. Zhang Taiming's transport vehicle loads lobsters every day and transports them to cities such as Nanjing and Shanghai. His brine lobster is sold to Beijing and Japan by plane. Jinhu lobster is becoming more and more famous in this kind of transportation.
Tao Guanghui, secretary of the county party committee: "We have 65,438+00,000 mu of clean shrimp ponds and 30,000 mu of mixed culture. We produce more than 7 million kilograms of lobster every year. What we eat ourselves has to be digested by 60% to 70% in our county. "