I asked him, "What do you think is the best?"
He replied, "Buddha jumps over the wall."
I said, "Then you haven't eaten Minnan food."
In fact, in the streets of southern Fujian, an iron pot, a coal stove and a pot of old oil fried things can better reflect the local characteristics. Fried dates in Xiamen are delicious. Use sweet potato powder as skin, peanuts, peas and sesame seeds as stuffing, knead into small balls, and fry in a pot, with a fragrant smell. Peanuts and sesame seeds will produce oil by themselves after slow frying, so the fried jujube stuffing is also very oily, which is very suitable for pasting autumn fertilizer. Zhajiang Noodles in Xiamen is also good. The bean curd skin is wrapped with stuffing made of lean meat, onion, dried fish, horseshoe, spiced powder and sweet potato powder, and fried in a pot until the bean curd skin is crisp and the stuffing is firm. It is a snack that can be eaten in autumn and winter, just like baking sweet potato chestnuts. Zhangzhou's hand-grabbed noodles are actually a large piece of fried dried bean curd with soaked alkaline noodles, sweet noodle sauce, garlic sauce, sand tea sauce, Chili sauce and mustard sauce, which you can eat with your hands. There is a lot of sauce in the flour roll, which will drip all the way to your hand, so although it is delicious, it will test the skill of diners. If you are not careful, your clothes will collapse.
But these fried things are not as delicious as Quanzhou vinegar meat.
The production of vinegar meat is actually very simple. Slice lean pork, marinate in vinegar, and finally hang sweet potato powder and fry in oil pan. At first glance, it is not much different from ordinary fried pork chops, or in fact, but after you eat it yourself, you will find that it is a thousand miles away.
In Quanzhou, vinegar meat is very popular, from star-rated hotels to street stalls, which shows its charm in the hearts of local people. And strangely enough, as long as you are out of Quanzhou, you can rarely see the shadow of vinegar meat. The most authentic one I have ever eaten was in an unknown shop in Liuguan Road Food Street. The proprietress is a three-generation old Quanzhou native. She used to be a buyer in a department store. She opened her own vinegar butcher shop during the laid-off tide in the 1990s, which is famous for its exquisite production.
There are generally three methods for the so-called exquisite vinegar-preserved meat. First of all, the sliced meat should be thin, so that it will cook quickly and not paste under high temperature frying; Secondly, vinegar stains must stay overnight, in addition to letting the vinegar taste penetrate into the lean meat thoroughly, it can also make the meat more distinct and refreshing; The most important thing is that the powder must be hung thin and evenly, and it can't be pasted, so that the vinegar smell in the meat won't volatilize under frying.
The vinegar meat just fried is the best. Sprinkle a little spiced powder while it is hot. The outer layer of the entrance is crispy, and the inside can be jealous and sour. If there is a bowl of boiled noodles, make a dish of fried vinegar meat. The vinegar meat is soft and fragrant, and there is a little sour and fresh fragrance in the noodle soup. The taste is unparalleled.
Chongqing has the custom of frying crispy meat and rinsing hot pot, which is quite similar to the vinegar soaked rice noodles in Quanzhou. But the difference is that the outer layer of crispy meat is wrapped with thick pulp, and the finished product is fatty. The vinegar meat is wrapped in thin powder, and the finished product is thin and clear. As soon as you get taller, your essence will stand out.
Lin Yutang is also from southern Fujian. He summed up two characteristics that distinguish Chinese food from western food: "First, eating is the texture of eating it, which makes our teeth feel crisp or elastic;" The second is the harmonious art relying on various interests. "This may not be all right, but I think when he wrote these words, he might have vinegar meat in his mind.