The group started from Shuntianfu (now Beijing) and went to Hejianfu (now hejian city, Hebei) first. In order to observe the people's feelings, Emperor Qianlong left behind a large number of officials and the empress dowager, went out traveling incognito and spent the night in a small inn. Who knows, just after childhood, Lord Qianlong suddenly felt hungry and ordered someone to find something to eat. But at this time, it was already dark, and where to find delicious food, the inn cook used his quick wits to find the baked wheat cakes that had not been sold out during the day, stuffed them into the stewed donkey meat left over from dinner, heated them on charcoal fire and sent them to the emperor. He took a bite and was stunned. What is crisp and delicious! The cook hesitated for a long time, but could not answer. Just then, a frog came outside. With a wave of his hand, Gan Long said, "Just call it' Toad Swallows Honey'." Since then, donkey meat has gained the reputation of "toad swallowing honey". As for why Lord Qianlong compares himself to a toad here, later generations can't find a solution by rummaging through the history books.
Leave Hejian mansion, go south, and soon reach Chengwu, which makes chengwu very worried. The story that Ganlongye Hejianfu praised the burning of donkey meat soon spread all over the country. According to the grapevine, the emperor also rewarded 300 donkeys in Hejian Prefecture, encouraged them to develop the catering industry, strived to cook donkey meat all over the country, and unconditionally provided them with advertising support. Cheng Wu, on the other hand, has everything but delicious food. The magistrate wants to break his head and can't find anything to entertain long live the grandfather.
"Long live the old man. He is used to eating chicken, duck, fish and delicacies. It is better to give him some coarse grains and let him taste them." At the suggestion of the master, Chengwu ordered the snack "Sauce Head" of Chengwu to be put on the royal table. This big head sauce sounds bluffing, but it's actually pickled kohlrabi. After tasting it, Mr. Gan Long was really happy. With a wave of his hand, he became a free spokesperson for Sauce Head. After Qianlong left, the county magistrate touched the name "purple amber" given by the emperor to the sauce head and said, "Is the emperor an emperor after all?" In three words, the momentum will be different. "
Then, Lord Qianlong ate Luoyang Bufan soup, yi county pancakes, drank Linyi soup and tasted Weishan four-nosed crucian carp. He was "full of praise" all the way to Jiangsu and Zhejiang.
When I got here, Master Ganlong got lost more and more times. Almost every time I am starving, I will meet a poor/beautiful person to offer food. I was stunned by the smell, and I was inscribed at the height of my interest. Almost all the snacks in the south of the Yangtze River were discovered by Qianlong: Liuhe pig's head meat in Nanjing, Sweet and Sour Mandarin Fish in Suzhou, fish-head tofu in Hangzhou, stone fish in Ningbo, steamed buns in Wuxi and beggar chicken with unknown place names. ...
In his life, Ganlong not only visited the south of the Yangtze River six times, visited the west four times and visited the east four times, but also collected all the local cuisines in the series of "Say Good after Eating Ganlong". Ma Boyong drew a lost picture of Qianlong. You can feel it. Qianlong went from north to Heilongjiang, west to Sichuan and south to Guangzhou to explore delicious food.
Having said that, everyone should understand that it is ok to listen to these similar food legends as stories. If you explore carefully, you will find many loopholes.
You know, when the emperor went out to inspect, his palaces were built in advance, received by local officials, and every meal was recorded. Qianlong visited Jiangnan six times and built more than 30 single-row palaces, not to mention the roads and bridges along the way. Every time Ganlong goes on patrol, he takes Empress Dowager Cixi, concubines, ministers of civil and military affairs, more than 2,500 chariots and horses, more than 400 luxury carts, more than 6,000 lean horses and more than 0,000 exquisite cruise ships/kloc-not counting the tens of thousands of peasants accompanying him. With such a lineup, the emperor may not have time to travel incognito and get lost.
These are just life and travel. As for eating, Qianlong is also unambiguous. According to the list of meals selected by Qianlong Palace, Qianlong only eats two meals a day, namely breakfast and dinner. Breakfast is at six or seven in the morning and dinner is around two in the afternoon. There are about ten dishes in the morning and evening, and sometimes some dishes are sent by the Queen Mother and local officials. Besides, Gan Long has to have breakfast and lunch. When he gets up early, that is, around five o'clock, it is usually simple, such as stewed bird's nest with rock sugar, and then around six o'clock in the afternoon, there are about five kinds of dishes.
Of course, the emperor may not be able to eat all these dishes by himself, so the emperor often rewards the harem concubines with the dishes he can't finish, and sometimes makes the extra dishes into a table, which is called the forehead dish for the liegeman to eat. The following excerpt is taken from the one-day imperial meal list of Qianlong's southern tour. You can feel:
As can be seen from the list of imperial meals, Qianlong's southern tour did not eat less famous dishes in the south of the Yangtze River, but these famous dishes were prepared by Rizo, Zhang Dongguan, Song Yuan and others who served as imperial chefs in the palace or temporarily helped in the imperial dining room, or presented by local dignitaries such as Yin Jishan, Governor of Liangjiang River, Gaofeng of Salt Patrol, and Pufu weaving in Suzhou. Of course, if Ganlong particularly likes a certain dish, he will personally choose it, such as fried meat with leeks.
Gan Long also likes snacks, such as Bazhen cake. It is said that every time he finishes eating, even if there is leftovers, he will not be rewarded and will be returned to the eunuch. Among these snacks, Yuqian cake and powder cake are the most popular. "Yang Ji Zhai Cong Lu" once said: "Yu Qian's bread is sticky on the ground and is often eaten by northern people. Every tribute is in the palace. " On the way to Jiangnan, Yu Qian cakes often appear on the dining table. For example, on the 6th day of March in Qianlong's 30th year, at the dinner party in jiangning house Palace, "Yu Qian Wo Wo Yu Qian Cake was served". Qianlong himself has written poems for them many times:
At the same time, the mutton with spring bamboo shoots has also appeared in Qianlong's poem: "Spring bamboo shoots come to pay tribute to Beijing in the south, and the jade food is brand-new." Four episodes of Imperial Poetry (Volume 11), the slogan of bamboo shoots; "For a moment, I thought of eating sheep, but I asked ..." The Imperial Poem (volume 64), eating sheep.
In addition to chicken, duck and fish, Gan Long often eats vegetarian food during his southern tour. Because Ganlong's southern tour lasts from January to May, and the eighth day of April is the Buddhist "Buddha Bathing Festival" every year, so on this day, Gan Long and the Empress Dowager, who believe in Buddhism, will be vegetarians, and the imperial food stall also records their vegetarian menu:
Generally speaking, although the materials used for the south cruise ship of Ganlong River are not expensive, most of them are local specialties, and there are not many cooking methods, which are nothing more than traditional frying, stewing, frying and stewing, but everything from chicken, duck and fish to folk snacks is carefully cooked, and the handlers are either royal chefs or local famous chefs. It is hard to imagine that a person who is used to eating delicacies and has no shortage of high-quality pickles for breakfast will be full of praise for the sauce. There is also the kind of play in which someone knocks at the door in the middle of the night to beg for food, and when he opens the door, he finds it is the emperor. It can only be performed in TV series.
So, why do people still like the folk food story "Gan Long is full of praise for eating food"? In fact, it's very simple. You can get a free high-profile spokesperson by making up a short story, and you don't have to use it for nothing. After all, even hamburgers can be accompanied by a legend about real dried dragon food: