When it comes to old Beijing sesame sauce sesame pancakes, I think of a long big basket filled with palm-sized sesame seed pancakes. It is stuffed with sesame sauce and salt and pepper sandwiched with thousand layers of layers. It is charred on the outside and soft on the inside, crispy and delicious. When eating sesame cakes, it is important to hold the sesame cakes with one hand, and hold the fallen sesame seeds and sesame cake residue with the other hand underneath. They are all the essence... The rich aroma of sesame cakes can fill the entire shop and even the roadside outside. Those who are familiar with this smell will pass by. Foodies are attracted to it for no reason.

In Beijing, most of the delicious sesame sauce sesame pancakes come from Muslim restaurants: for example, at the Halal sesame seed pancakes in Niujie Hutong, long queues are a daily sight; at Houhai Liji Sauce Braised Pork Belly Restaurant, the sesame seed pancakes are the order of the day. Eat sheep tripe soup; Li Xiaolao’s Shaobing in Changying Hui Community outside the East Fifth Ring Road is also famous for several kilometers around. Even people who live in Yanjiao are fond of him. His house is overcrowded every morning, and the Shaobing is mixed with suey. Soup/bean soup is the most popular. In addition to eating the biscuits directly, eating them with mutton soup, eating them with barbecue, or eating them as a staple food after making hot pot, you can also cut the biscuits in the middle and stuff them with a few pieces of elbow meat or sauced lamb or beef. A Chinese-style burger that is "meat-filled with sesame biscuits and you can't get enough of it."

Lao She wrote in "Camel Xiangzi": "Xiangzi saved money for three years and bought his first car. He was so happy that he set the day of buying the car as his birthday. In order to celebrate this On a big day, the first transaction must be with a well-dressed person, and then, you should have a meal at the best food stall: such as hot biscuits stuffed with fried mutton. "In the eyes of Xiangzi, an ordinary commoner in the old days, hot biscuits stuffed with fried mutton. Can be enjoyed as a birthday meal.

According to historical research, sesame cakes were introduced to the Western Regions by Ban Chao of the Han Dynasty. "Continued Hanshu" records say: "Emperor Ling likes Hu cakes." Hu cakes are the earliest sesame cakes and became popular in the Tang Dynasty. According to the records of "Zizhi Tongjian. Xuanzong": During the Anshi Rebellion, Tang Xuanzong and Yang Guifei fled to Jixian Palace in Xianyang. They had nothing to eat. Yang Zhongguo, who was appointed prime minister, went to the market to buy Hu cakes and presented them. At that time, the first shop in Chang'an that was famous for making flax cakes was Fuxingfang. For this reason, the poet Bai Juyi wrote a poem and said: "The flax cake is modeled on Kyoto, with crispy noodles and oily aroma. It is sent to Ambassador Yang, who is hungry and slanderous. It tastes like a supplement." The cooking method of flax cake is to use clear flour and sesame spices. Salt flour, clear oil, alkaline flour, sugar and other raw materials are used as raw and auxiliary materials. The dough is mixed and fermented, crispy and flavourful, the batter is shaped, brushed with sugar color, sticky with sesame seeds, and baked in the oven. Therefore, Bai Juyi said that "the noodles are crispy and oily". This method is similar to modern Shaobing.

Zhao Yongshou, the imperial chef of the Qing Dynasty, devoted himself to studying the techniques of making sesame cakes and developed a unique multi-layered sesame sauce making technique for making sesame cakes. Ordinary sesame biscuits have about 15 layers, while Zhao Yongshou’s sesame sauce sesame biscuits can reach 21 layers, and there is no difference between heating them after cooling and freshly baked sesame biscuits. After the fall of the Qing Dynasty (early Republic of China), Zhao Yongshou lived among the people and started a sesame cake workshop, specializing in old Beijing multi-layered sesame sauce sesame cakes. In 1925, Zhao Renzhai, Zhao Yongshou and other former imperial kitchen chefs jointly opened Fangshan in Beihai Park, selling pastries, snacks and flavored dishes from the Qing Dynasty. In 1955, Fangshan became state-owned, and in 1956, it was renamed Fangshan Restaurant.

Tian Dezhong became a disciple of Zhao Yongshou at Fangshan Restaurant, where he learned the old Beijing multi-layer sesame sauce biscuits technique and became the second generation successor to the old Beijing multi-layer sesame sauce biscuits. Later, Tian Dezhong was transferred to the Longfu Temple snack bar as a chef. Wang Fuyu worshiped Tian Dezhong as his teacher and became the third generation successor. Later, Feng Huaishen became a disciple of Wang Fuyu and became the fourth generation inheritor. Feng Huaishen was worried that the old Beijing sesame cake might be lost. In order to prevent this skill from being lost, he recruited two disciples and recruited 20 people. In 2017, Feng Huaishen applied for an intangible cultural heritage for the old Beijing Shaobing making skills in Fangshan District and became the inheritor. The craftsmanship and culture of old Beijing’s multi-layered sesame sauce biscuits have been passed down to this day.

Maybe you are used to queuing up at a time-honored store to buy a bag of sesame seed cakes and eating them home, but you can also try making them at home in your spare time. I remember that during the epidemic around the Spring Festival, many people learned to make dough at home and successfully made steamed buns and steamed buns.

The same goes for making sesame cakes. You won’t know if you don’t try it, but you will know once you try it. It turns out that making delicious food can be fun and addictive once you get started... Today I will share with you the home-made recipe of old Beijing sesame sauce sesame cakes. If you are interested, you may wish to give it a try. Get up and try it~

1. How to make Old Beijing sesame sauce biscuits:

Ingredients: 250 grams of flour, 2 grams of baking soda, 10 grams of cooking oil, 50 grams of sesame paste, water 140 grams, 2 grams of pepper noodles, 2 grams of cumin noodles, 3 grams of salt, appropriate amount of sesame seeds, a little soy sauce and sugar