Dezhou Braised Chicken originated from the Ming Dynasty, was created in the Qing Dynasty, and was passed down to the Republic of China. It is a famous historical food famous both at home and abroad.

After more than ten generations of arduous management and development by grilled chicken artists, it has become a unique Chinese delicacy from a local specialty. It has unique characteristics in terms of color, aroma, taste, shape, quality and nutrition, and is known as "one of the wonders of China".

"China's No. 1 Chicken".

There are various theories about the origin of Dezhou Braised Chicken, such as: "The watermelon in Dezhou comes from Wucheng's rice seedlings, and the Braised Chicken in Dezhou comes from Yucheng's soup", which means that Dezhou Braised Chicken originated in Yucheng (county-level city); there are also rumors that

Dezhou Braised Chicken is the result of continuous refinement and summary by successive generations of Dezhou roast chicken merchants.

And each saying has an allusion.

At the end of the Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, with the busy water transportation, Dezhou became the royal road from Kyoto to nine provinces.

The economy began to boom, and roast chicken appeared on the market.

Old men carrying baskets selling roast chicken often appear near canal wharves, flood and drought stations and government offices in the city.

This kind of roasted chicken is a roasted chicken that has been carefully prepared manually and is full of flavor: it is shaped like lying on its side, red in color and fragrant, and the meat is tender and delicious. It became the prototype of the later braised chicken and first emerged.

With the development of the economy, Dezhou City entered its heyday and became one of the 33 largest cities in the country.

Along the water and land thoroughfares, merchants gathered, and goods from all over the country were distributed here. There were "clouds of tourists coming from the south and the north, and there were many restaurants and inns like a forest."

Roast chicken is no longer just seen on the dining table, but has also "stepped" into society.

There are many people selling roasted chicken with a suitcase on their arm. At first, it was a family named Jia. Later, the more famous family was Xu Enrong's family, nicknamed "Xu Roasted Chicken", and the Zhang family in the west. It was not uncommon for people to set up shops with open doors.

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Of course, those who eat roasted chicken at this time are still limited to dignitaries, businessmen and rich people, and the common people can only look at the chicken and sigh.

But the inventors and producers of roast chicken are real working people.

In order to support their families, they worked hard and managed miserably, and at the same time they also made contributions to society.

Later, chicken delicacies were developed, and in small family workshops and ancient and extensive craftsmanship, the original chicken culture was born.

In the 31st year of Kangxi's reign (1692 AD), there was a roast chicken maker named Jia Jiancai who ran a roast chicken shop on Ximenwai Street in Dezhou City.

Since this street leads to the canal pier, the small business is pretty good.

One day, shopkeeper Jia went out on urgent business.

He asked the waiter to suppress the fire.

Unexpectedly, Shopkeeper Jia walked away, and soon the boy fell asleep in front of the stove. When he woke up, he found that it was overcooked.

When he was at a loss, shopkeeper Jia came back and tried to fish out the chicken and take it to the store to sell.

Unexpectedly, the smell of chicken was so tempting that it attracted many passers-by to buy it.

The customer bought it and tasted it, and praised: Not only is the rotten meat delicious, but even the bones are crispy and fragrant when chewed. It can be said that the fragrance penetrates through the bones.

Afterwards, shopkeeper Jia devoted himself to research and improved his skills.

This led to the original method of braised chicken, that is, boiling it over high heat and simmering it over low heat. In current parlance, the cooking method requires martial arts first and then civility. The martial arts are orderly. This is why braised chicken is called "braised chicken".

Jia’s Chicken is famous, so regular customers suggested giving the chicken a name.

Shopkeeper Jia himself couldn't think of becoming famous.

After some days, I suddenly remembered that there was an old scholar named Ma on the street, and I thought he could give me a good name.

So he wrapped two steaming chickens that had just come out of the pot with lotus leaves, walked quickly to Ma Xiucai's house on Majia Liukou Street, and asked the scholar to name the chickens.

Ma Xiucai tasted the chicken and asked about how to make it. He tasted it and chanted smoothly: "When the heat shakes the bones and flesh, the fragrant fragrance hits your nose; it makes me stretch out my fingers, and my mouth and teeth are filled with sweet fluids." The poem.

After finishing the chant, he blurted out: "What a five-spice boneless braised chicken!" In the second year, 1693, Jia Jiancai brought the braised chicken to the Lantern Festival for sale, and the sales were booming and his reputation became great.

Since then, there has been a situation in Dezhou City where roast chicken and braised chicken are produced and sold at the same time.

With the opening of the Jinpu Railway and Shide Railway, Dezhou braised chicken business has entered a prosperous period, presenting a scene of "a hundred schools of thought contending".

In order to prosper their own business, the shopkeepers inherited the skills and secretly "stole" each other's skills, which objectively contributed to the great improvement of braised chicken making skills.

At this time, most braised chicken shops were concentrated in front of the train station square, with shops and stalls dotted all over the place.

Walking down the street, the aroma is fragrant and makes you salivate.

The main representatives of the successors of braised chicken in this period are Hou Baoqing of the "Baolan Zhai" braised chicken shop and Han Shigong of the "Deshun Zhai" braised chicken shop, as well as the five families of Zhang, Cui and Duanmu (all natives of Dezhou).

Understand the key points of Jia and Xu's production.

Han Shigong is a businessman who is not good at talking and focuses on processing skills.

In practice, he explored and summarized the experience of his predecessors in making roasted and grilled chicken, improved the technology, added ingredients, and worked hard on washing, cooking, and frying the chicken, especially simmering it.

At first he was on his own, and then he collaborated with Wu Qinghai and Cui Jinlu to open a grilled chicken shop called "Deshun Zhai".

Finally, together with Zhang Jintang, Zhang Jingui, and Duanmu Zhaorong, they opened a four-storey restaurant called "Zhongxin Zhai". They cooperated and exchanged skills. They abandoned roasted chicken and specialized in braised chicken, which laid a solid foundation for the further development of braised chicken skills.

The foundation serves as a link between the past and the future.

At this time, with trains extending in all directions, sales expanded to the Northeast, Central Plains and South China, with annual sales reaching 300,000.

"Singing rooster makes the world white." The founding of the People's Republic of China brought new life to the braised chicken industry. The number of braised chicken shops has grown to more than 30, with annual sales of more than 400,000 braised chickens.

There have been shop names such as "Deshun Zhai", "Baolan Zhai", "Shenglan Zhai", "Fushun Zhai", "Central Zhai" and so on.

In the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the braised chicken industry embarked on the road of cooperation.