From the menu, Chairman Mao eats casually. He never eats in order, but when he is hungry or has time. And most of the time, Chairman Mao rarely eats seriously except attending banquets. He basically makes cereal or corn paste with milk, plus moldy tofu, even if it is Chairman Mao's meal.
Even so, Chairman Mao never had three meals a day, usually two meals a day, and only one meal a day under some special circumstances. Finally, I have time to eat some dinner. Chairman Mao also eats while reading newspapers. The only difference is that he will seriously fry several dishes.
For Chairman Mao's irregular eating habits, the health care doctor in charge of Chairman Mao's health is very worried about this and often advises Chairman Mao to eat and rest on time. Chairman Mao usually has his own theory about these "admonitions". Chairman Mao thinks that you can't listen to them or all of them. If you don't listen, you will die. It is all death, but it is necessary according to your own needs.
Chairman Mao likes peppers, moldy tofu and other dishes, all of which will have an impact on the body. Health care doctors have also been paying attention to them and advised Chairman Mao to pay attention to nutritional balance.
Chairman Mao has his own "balance theory". When a health care doctor advised Chairman Mao, Chairman Mao said, "I am used to eating these things. Your balance is theoretical, my balance is my own, and your point of view is confusing and destroying my balance. Practice tests truth. What you have done may have your reasons, but when you reach my age, you may not have my body. "
Chairman Mao's simple and simple eating habits can also be seen in purslane, which frequently appears on the menu. Chairman Mao not only eats purslane himself, but also recommends it to others, paying more attention to the medicinal properties of this dish itself.
1June, 959, Chairman Mao inspected Wuhan. After listening to the report of Wang, secretary of Hubei Provincial Party Committee, he just caught dinner, and Chairman Mao stayed with Wang for dinner. According to the recipe records, there are seven dishes for dinner: fried eel fillets, roasted radish, fried purslane, scrambled eggs, sliced pork soup, iron plate tenderloin and fried kelp.
According to the staff present at the time, during the dinner, Wang sat next to Chairman Mao. Chairman Mao specially gave Wang a chopstick, Portulaca oleracea, and said to Wang, "Don't underestimate this dish, it is still a good Chinese medicine, which can clear away heat and damp."
There are many examples of Chairman Mao persuading people to eat purslane. According to the menu, one spring, Chairman Mao specially asked the staff to pick a variety of wild vegetables and held a "mountain treasure party" to invite the children to have dinner with the staff. Portulaca oleracea is one of the "delicacies" and also a main course.
At first, health care doctors didn't understand the efficacy of purslane, and they were quite uneasy about Chairman Mao's habit of eating this wild vegetable. They specially collected purslane and sent it to relevant departments for testing, and at the same time consulted a large number of pharmacopoeias. The result is, of course, as Chairman Mao said, this wild vegetable is not only harmless, but also a good medicine.
Portulaca oleracea L. has pharmacological effects of dredging channels, detoxicating and eliminating dampness, and has a good curative effect on Chairman Mao's constipation, asthma and cough. Portulaca oleracea has therefore become a food that employees can rest assured. Not only will it not stop Chairman Mao from eating, but it will also take the initiative to fry a plate for Chairman Mao from time to time.
Looking up Zhongnanhai's May 3rd 1967 "Requirements for Farm Planting Plan", we can see that the farm ranks Portulaca oleracea as the first in the column of "vegetables with key guaranteed supply", which requires "perennial supply, with an average daily output of one catty, fat and tender, and no seeds". These requirements are to ensure that Chairman Mao can eat purslane at any time.
Chairman Mao's eating habits have always been dominated by Chinese food, but Chairman Mao does not deny western food, so Chairman Mao will occasionally "eat kai yang meat". In the early 1960s, the staff began to customize western food recipes for Chairman Mao. Judging from the preserved recipes, the contents listed are set according to Chairman Mao's dietary preferences as far as possible, and they are not western food in the pure sense.
The menu includes seven cuisines, including fish and shrimp, chicken and duck, pork, mutton, beef and soup. Among them, Chairman Mao is interested in fish, shrimp and chicken dishes. After eating fish and shrimp for a while, he will try western-style fish and shrimp for a change.
Chairman Mao is more interested in the practice of chicken in western food. Therefore, the staff designed many dishes, most of which were improved on the basis of Chinese food, so that many innovative western dishes appeared, such as buttered chicken rolls, soft fried chicken chops, canned braised chicken, braised chicken with red onion, braised chicken with green vegetables, wrapped chicken, chicken coconut, cream chicken and so on.
Chairman Mao didn't just eat western food, but put these dishes on the table together with traditional Chinese food, which is why the western food on Chairman Mao's table is so China-like. But even this kind of Chinese western food, Chairman Mao only eats it once in a while and doesn't regard it as a dinner.