The ruling center of the Northern Song Dynasty was in the north, trading with ethnic minorities. The meat is mainly mutton, while the ruling center of the Southern Song Dynasty is in the south, which is rich in fish, so the meat is mainly fish.

Eating sheep in the Song Dynasty was a popular custom of the royal family. In Song Zhenzong, the royal chef slaughtered 350 sheep every day, while in Injong, he slaughtered 280 sheep every day, while in Yingzong, it was reduced to 40 sheep every day. In Zongshen, although pork consumption was introduced, the royal chef consumed "434,463 Jin and mutton 4 Liang" a year, and pork only used "4 1 365,438 Jin", which was less than mutton consumption.

The royal family prevailed, and naturally, from officials to the people, mutton became the first-class meat on the table in the Song Dynasty. Whether it's a wedding, a funeral, a scholar's award, or burning incense, the villagers are embarrassed to entertain guests if there is no sheep in the case.

Su Dongpo, a famous gourmet, was tired of eating sheep when he was an official in Beijing. Although he was "tired and fat for ten years in Beijing", when he was sent to Huizhou to live under surveillance, he was still attracted by the official sheep killing once a month. As a criminal, he can't eat mutton any more, but it's satisfying to get some sheep bones and bake them.

In Song Dynasty, pork was not the main meat of literati, or it was a kind of low-grade meat. In the Southern Song Dynasty, Emperor Gaozong dined in the mansion of Zhang Jun, king of Qinghe County. In the menu, everything runs on the ground, flies in the air and swims in the water, except pork. However, there were 3,000 kilograms of pork in Emperor Gaozong's travel ban recipe, which showed that the main consumer groups of pork at that time were indeed of low grade. So Su Dongpo said, "(Pork) The rich refuse to eat, and the poor don't understand."

But among ordinary people, pork is the staple food. According to Dream of Tokyo, tens of thousands of pigs are bought by traffickers from four towns and sent to Tokyo every day. Countless pork vendors and countless "Zheng butchers" slaughtered these pigs and sent the meat to the table of ordinary people.

It was Su Dongpo who really came into contact with pork with aristocratic spirit. In Hangzhou, because of the need to manage the West Lake and solve the problem of migrant workers' eating, he creatively invented the "small fire and slow stew" cubic fertilizer. This pork dish made of ginger, onion, brown sugar, cooking wine and soy sauce is named "Dongpo Meat".

Mutton is the most expensive place for Han people, but in the Liao and Jin Dynasties in the north, on the contrary, pork became higher. In Song Dynasty, envoys were sent to Liao and Jin, and northerners entertained envoys with the best pork. Pork in Liao and Jin is a "no big feast". Why does pork exist at the same time, and the treatment between North and South countries is so different? The reason is nothing more than "things are rare", there are few pigs in Liao and Jin, and pork is expensive; In Song Dynasty, there were few sheep, but mutton was beautiful. So when exchanging goods, the two sides exchange the goods they need. Liao and Jin exported fat sheep for pigs in the Song Dynasty, and both sides were very happy.