Drilling wood for fire, cooked food has since entered the era of stone cooking.

2. Fu period.

In diet, make nets to teach tenants to fish and raise sacrifices to fill the kitchen.

3. Shennong period

Agricultural Pottery is a pioneering work of agriculture in China. Taste a hundred herbs, prescribe ancient medicine, invent thunder, and teach the people to farm. Pottery utensils made it possible for people to have cookers and containers for the first time, making it possible to make fermented foods, such as wine, sugar, acyl (vinegar), cheese, sugar, sugar and so on. Ding was one of the earliest chefs. It had claws because there was no stove and there was a pot. Its claws are hollow and used for cooking wine.

4, the Yellow Emperor period

The diet of the Chinese nation has improved again. The emperor started as a kitchen god, concentrated his firepower on saving fuel and making food cooked quickly, but it was widely used in Qin and Han dynasties when kettles and tall cookers gradually withdrew from the historical stage. "Steaming grains for drinking and cooking grains for porridge" is the first time to distinguish foods because of cooking methods, and a steamer was invented, called retort. Steamed salt industry was invented by Su Sha, a courtier of the Yellow Emperor. Since then, he has not only learned how to cook, but also how to adjust it, which is good for people's health. delicious

5. Zhou and Qin Dynasties

During the formation of China's food culture, grains and vegetables were staple foods. During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, self-produced food and vegetables were basically available, but the structure was different from that of now. At that time, the early field work was mainly: millet (the most important thing) was millet, also called millet, which was dominant for a long time and was the length of five grains. A good millet is called Liang's masterpiece, also known as. Millet is the rhubarb glutinous rice next to millet, also called millet, which is threshed millet. Wheat and barley. Bitter, beans, mainly soybeans and black beans. Hemp is pitted. Both glutinous rice and hemp are eaten by the poor, and hemp is also called glutinous rice.

There is also rice in the south. The ancient rice was glutinous rice, and the common rice was called japonica rice. It was not until a few weeks later that rice was introduced into the Central Plains, which belongs to flour and rice and is more precious. Zizania latifolia Bunge, a kind of aquatic plant Zizania latifolia Bunge, is black, and it is called carved glutinous rice, which is particularly fragrant and smooth. Put it into a leather bag with broken porcelain pieces, knead and thresh.

6. Han dynasty

The rich period of China's food culture is attributed to the exchange of food culture between China and the West (Western Regions) in the Han Dynasty. Pomegranate, sesame, grapes, walnuts (namely walnuts), watermelons, melons, cucumbers, spinach, carrots, fennel, celery, lentils, alfalfa (mainly used for horse food), lettuce, green onions and garlic were introduced, and some cooking methods, such as frying oil, were also introduced. Liu An, the king of Huainan, invented tofu, which made the nutrition of beans easy to digest, with good quality and low price, and made many kinds of dishes. The stone carving of Tofu Workshop was found on the large relief stone of the Han Tomb found in Mi County, Henan Province on 1960.

Vegetable oil was also invented in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Before that, animal oil was called grease, horned animal oil was called grease, and hornless animal oil was called ointment. Fat hard, paste thin, soft. Vegetable oils include almond oil, shea butter and sesame oil, but they are rare. After the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the variety of vegetable oil increased and the price was cheap.

7. Tang and Song Dynasties

The pinnacle of food culture is too particular. The most representative example of "Suzhou Steamed Voice and Wangchuan Pattern" is barbecue.

8. Ming and Qing Dynasties

Food culture is another peak, which is the continuation and development of food customs in Tang and Song Dynasties. At the same time, it is mixed with the characteristics of ignorance. Great changes have taken place in the food structure. Staple food: wild rice was completely eliminated, and pockmarked withdrew from the staple food to use oil. Bean material is no longer a staple food, but has become a dish. The proportion of wheat in the Yellow River valley in the north has increased significantly, and noodles have become the staple food in the north since the Song Dynasty. In the Ming Dynasty, potatoes, sweet potatoes and vegetables were introduced again on a large scale. Meat: Livestock and poultry raised artificially become the main source of meat. Man-Han banquet represents the highest level of food culture in Qing Dynasty.

Characteristics of China's Food Culture

1, with excellent materials.

The raw materials used in various cuisines include main ingredients, ingredients, auxiliary materials and seasonings. There is a lot of pressure and certain rules. In a word, it is the word "essence" and "essence", which is what Confucius said: "Fine food never tires, fine food never tires". The so-called "refined" refers to the selected raw materials, taking into account their varieties, producing areas, seasons, growth periods and other characteristics, with fresh, tender and excellent as the top priority.

During the Han and Tang Dynasties, it was customary to call delicious things "eight treasures". Regarding the Song Dynasty, Bazhen refers to eight precious cooking materials. There are many series of "Eight Treasures" in Qing Dynasty, which mainly refer to banquets of eight kinds of precious raw materials.

2. Skilled knife work

As early as ancient times, China attached importance to the use of knife-cutting. After repeated practice by chefs of past dynasties, he created rich knife-cutting methods, such as straight knife-cutting method, slicing knife-cutting method (marking knife marks on raw materials without cutting them off), carving knife-cutting method, etc., and processed raw materials into pieces, strips, silk, blocks, diced, granules, velvet, mud and other forms and pills and balls.

In particular, the combination of knife skills and hand waving makes clinker and edible raw materials into artistic and lifelike fancy platters of flowers, birds, insects, fish, flowers and plants, such as Prosperous Dragon and Phoenix, Proud, Magpie in the Plum, Lotus Crane and Double Phoenix Flower Basket. For example, "Proud as a Peacock" is made of fifteen kinds of raw materials, including duck meat, ham, pig tongue, quail eggs, crab claws, cucumber, etc., and it has been completed through twenty-two fine knife work and assembly processes.

It is not only writers who regard exquisite knife work as a perfect artistic appreciation, but also ordinary people often see it at a glance. In ancient times, in order to broaden their horizons, someone specially organized a fencing performance, which caused a sensation. In the Southern Song Dynasty, Zeng Sanyi said that one year Mount Tai held a unique performance, and "the best art in the world" naturally included people who were good at cooking. "There was a man who asked a man to bow down to the ground with his bare back, carrying a catty of meat on his back as several, and carrying it with a knife. Try to withdraw the meat, the soldier's back is not hurt at all. " Taking a person's back as a chopping block, cutting pork and shredding it without hurting his back, this move cannot but be amazing.

3. Unique temperature

"Chef China" can accurately identify different firepower such as strong fire, medium fire and weak fire, be familiar with the heat resistance of various raw materials, skillfully control the time of using fire, be good at mastering the properties of heat transfer objects (oil, water and gas), and determine the cooking order according to the tenderness, water content, shape and size of raw materials and the thickness of the whole block, and use it flexibly to make the cooked dishes tender, crisp and delicious. As early as ancient times, "Chef China" made a special study on heat, expounding the changing rules and main points of heat: "Five flavors and three ingredients, nine boiling and nine changes, will surely win with it, without losing its reason."

Su Shi, a great poet in the Northern Song Dynasty, was not only a gourmet, but also a chef. He created the famous Dongpo meat dishes, which is closely related to his good use of cooking time. He also wrote these experiences into a stew poem: "Slow fire, less water, natural beauty when cooking." Later generations used his experience, with a small sealed fire cook the meat. The meat is original, oily and bright red, rotten but not broken, waxy but not greasy, tender as tofu, good palatability and outstanding flavor.

4. Different technologies

Commonly used techniques are: stir-frying, frying, boiling, boiling, frying, pasting, stewing, roasting, braising, stewing, boiling, dipping, steaming, roasting, mixing, frying, smoking, and painting beets, honey juice and frosting. Different processes have different flavor characteristics. Each technique has several or even dozens of famous dishes. The famous "beggar chicken" is famous for its mud roasting technology. According to legend, a beggar stole a chicken in Changshu, Jiangsu Province in ancient times. Because there was no stove, he slaughtered the chicken, took out its internal organs, put in onion salt, sewed it up, pasted it with yellow mud, roasted it on the fire, and knocked on the ground to eat it when the mud was cooked. The meat is tender and fragrant.

After being improved by the chef, it is roasted with a variety of seasonings, which tastes better and becomes a famous dish. Yunnan's "crossing the bridge rice noodles" is a masterpiece of techniques. According to legend, in ancient times, a scholar was studying in his study. His wife created this method in order to make him eat hot soup and rice: the hen was boiled into boiling chicken soup, and then cut into thin chicken slices, fish slices, shrimp slices and rice noodles. Because the oil floating on the surface can keep warm and cook the above food, it can keep warm and tender after crossing the bridge, so this method is created.

5. Harmony of Five Flavors

There are also various methods of seasoning, including basic seasoning, stereotyped seasoning and auxiliary seasoning, among which stereotyped seasoning is the most widely used. The so-called stereotyped seasoning refers to the seasoning in the process of heating raw materials to determine the taste of dishes. Basic seasoning is performed before heating, which belongs to pretreatment seasoning. Auxiliary seasoning is carried out after heating, or seasoning when eating.

In this way, the five flavors in the so-called "harmony of five flavors" are a general reference. The dishes we enjoy are generally compound flavors of more than two flavors, and they are changeable. Huangdi Neijing said: "The beauty of five flavors is unparalleled"; "Wen Zi" said: "The beauty of the five flavors can't be tasted", which means that the harmony of the five flavors can bring wonderful enjoyment to people.

In short, whether the seasoning is just right depends on the material conditions such as complete varieties and excellent texture, and the key lies in whether the chef matches it properly. There are strict requirements on seasoning proportion, blanking sequence and seasoning time (pre-cooking, medium-cooking and post-cooking). As long as we are meticulous, we can make the dishes reach the predetermined flavor.

6. Elegant mood

China's food culture is elegant in emotional appeal and artistic in atmosphere, which is mainly manifested in three aspects: beauty, fame and beauty.

Yuan Mei quoted an old saying in Suiyuan Food List: "The ancients said that food is not as good as utensils, which means that eating beautiful utensils is also beautiful, and food should be accompanied by beautiful utensils, so as to add color to beauty.

The beauty of China's utensils lies in their quality, shape, decoration and harmony with food. The beauty of ancient tableware in China mainly includes pottery, porcelain, bronze, gold and silver, jade, lacquerware and glassware. The rough beauty of painted pottery, the elegant beauty of porcelain, the solemn beauty of bronze, the transparent beauty of lacquerware, the brilliant beauty of gold and silver, and the bright beauty of glass all give people who use it a kind of beauty enjoyment, which is another kind of beauty enjoyment besides food.

The beauty of exquisite utensils is not only limited to the quality, shape and decoration of the utensils themselves, but also lies in the beauty of their combination and the beauty of their collocation with dishes.

The tripod in the Zhou Dynasty, the cup set in the Han Dynasty, and the silver tableware in the Manchu-Han banquet in Confucius' House all embody a kind of combined beauty. There are 404 pieces of silver tableware specially designed by Confucius for Manchu-Han banquet, which can serve 196 dishes. This set of tableware is partly antique and partly food. The decoration of the utensils is also exquisite, inlaid with jade, jadeite, agate, coral and so on. , engraved with all kinds of flower patterns, and some are also engraved with poems and auspicious words, which is even more elegant and extraordinary.

The tableware of Confucius Manchu-Han banquet is set according to the four-four system pattern, which is divided into small tableware, water tableware, fire tableware and snack box. The harmony between beauty and food is the highest realm of food aesthetics. In Du Fu's "Two Ways", "The red hump is brought to them by jade broilers, and the crystal surface is plain; But the finely crafted Phoenix meat cleaver is rarely used. At the same time, it recites the beauty of food and utensils, and sets off the elegant realm of the beauty of food and utensils.

In China, there is no nameless dish on the dining table. A wonderful dish name is not only a vivid advertising word, but also an organic part of the dish name itself. The name of a dish gives people beautiful enjoyment. Passing it to the brain through auditory or visual perception will produce a series of psychological effects, which can play a role that the color, shape and taste of dishes can't play.