Ouyang Xiu (1007-1072), a great writer in the history of Chinese literature, liked to eat pork from a restaurant in Kaifeng City, Bianzhou - then the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty.

When he moved to Yingzhou, he compared the pork cooked by Yingzhou chefs and said that it was not as good as the pork cooked by Bianzhou chefs.

He particularly misses the pork cooked in Bianzhou restaurants.

In his later years, Ouyang Xiu wrote his memoirs called "Guitian Lu" (written in 1071), which contains a story about a minister eating out in a restaurant.

That is the story of his predecessors in the Song Zhenzong era (998-1022) before Ouyang Xiu became an official.

The protagonist's name is Lu Zongdao.

One day, Mrs. Lu went to a restaurant to entertain relatives and friends. The restaurant was famous and called "Renhe Winery".

At that time, it happened that the emperor came to see him for something and sent an envoy to his house to see him.

The central envoy waited for a long time and did not return from Lu.

When Julu family paid homage to the emperor, the emperor had been waiting for a long time.

The emperor asked Mr. Lu why he was so late in coming. Mr. Lu answered the truth, saying that he was entertaining guests outside and kept the officials waiting for a long time. He also said that the cooking facilities in restaurants outside were more professional and not as simple as the utensils at home.

This story allows us to see that in Bianjing under the Zhenzong Dynasty of the Northern Song Dynasty, restaurant food was more exquisite than home food, and the cooking utensils were better than those used at home.

One of the important points that emerges from this story is that cooking chefs maintain a professional career.

In addition, the food in restaurants has surpassed the food in aristocratic homes.

This is a very important new era in the history of Chinese foreign cuisine.

During the nine hundred years from the Han Dynasty to the early Tang Dynasty, travelers and merchants lived in residences and shops, and all they ate was coarse food.

The delicacies in society can only be found in the home-cooked meals of the upper class.

Telling the story of his predecessors falling in love with Bianjing restaurant, Ouyang Xiu himself is no different.

These two scholar-bureaucrats who fell in love with Bianjing restaurants are not special. This is an extremely common thing.

In the same memoir, Ouyang Xiu also told a story about two of his friends, Shi Manqing and Liu Qian, having a drinking fight at a newly opened restaurant.

After that, there was a widespread rumor: "There are two wine masters in Wang's restaurant who come to drink for a long time." The restaurant not only sells wine, but also cooks food to go with the wine.

In the aforementioned restaurant where Lu Zongdao had a banquet, Ouyang Xiu also said of this restaurant: "The wine is famous in the capital." This wine restaurant even has an address handed down from generation to generation, which is located in the Bathhouse Lane outside the Songmen Gate of Bianjing.

Isn't this amazing?

It's like today's TV food programs always tell the audience where the food restaurants are located and serve them.

Don’t think that it will only take a long time for restaurants to appear in Ayutthaya.

The phenomenon of restaurants in Dacheng described by Ouyang Xiu was only two hundred years old when he wrote about it.

In other words, professional chefs and delicious food and wine served in restaurants are new cultural phenomena that only appeared in the ninth century in Chinese history.

In the Middle Ages of China (approximately the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, Sui Dynasty, and the first half of the Tang Dynasty), administrative cities did not originally have shopping streets, let alone many shops.

Chinese administrative cities between the 5th and 9th centuries were divided into hundreds or dozens of blocks, which were called "fangs" at that time. Each block was surrounded by a block wall. Every day at night, not only the city-wide curfew was imposed, but also each block was under a curfew.

The entrance and exit, the "fangmen", must be locked.

Commercial transactions in the city are limited to about two designated markets, called "East Market" and "West Market" in Chang'an, and "North Market" and "West Market" in Luoyang, and the market is limited to opening at noon.

The market closed in the afternoon and evening.

This was the same operating model in the two capitals of the Tang Dynasty, namely Chang'an and Luoyang.

This situation was due to the decline of the Tang Empire's control over society and the rapid growth of the capital's consumer economy. The old methods of designated markets and closing the market after dusk every day were no longer sufficient. Therefore, the market was abolished and demolished.

The movement of the wall spread throughout the city, and the walls were torn down and replaced with storefront doors, and the scene of numerous shopping streets throughout the city emerged.

This part is the urban commercial veil unveiled to us by the sages who studied urban history in the past. It has a specific name, called the collapse of the city-fang system.

After the city system was abandoned, the two capitals of the Tang Dynasty began to open their city gates all day long, and even kept their city gates open.

At the beginning of this book, it is told that Bai Juyi rode into the city late one night in the summer of 1836. This is just an example of the changes in the daily routine of residents in this emerging city.

When the city system was in full swing, the commercial scale was limited to mobile breakfast vendors at the entrance of each city.

This is to adapt to being a guest in another house during the day, missing the locking time of the house door, and being forced to stay overnight temporarily, or at the invitation of the owner.

The next day, when the morning light shone on the walls of the square and the gate of the square was about to open, the guests took advantage of the breakfast stall at the gate of the square to solve the problem of hunger and revolution.