Why do books that introduce local history necessarily introduce local food culture? Because food culture is an important part and reference of a regional culture. For example, if a place's staple food is mainly dry food, then at least one period in its history must be a natural disaster and war-prone zone. As a native of Yangzhou, I am deeply interested in the local culture. However, the topic of "Yangzhou regional culture" covers a wide range, and my ability is limited, so it is really difficult to study "Yangzhou regional culture". A drop of water can reflect the light of the sun, and Yangzhou's food culture can reflect Yangzhou culture from one side. So today I decided to talk about the extensive and profound Yangzhou food culture with Yangzhou food culture as the topic!

Yangzhou's food has long been praised by the world, and there is a saying that "eat in Yangzhou, wear in Suzhou and play in Hangzhou". It can be seen that Yangzhou people have long been famous for their exquisite food. Yangzhou food culture is rich in regional, folk customs and social environment, which is an important part of Yangzhou's history and culture, bringing infinite glory and pride to the city, and it is a shining golden signboard. At the APEC meeting in Shanghai in 2111, the news that Bush had a special liking for "Yangzhou fried rice" suddenly appeared in the global media, greatly enhancing the popularity of Yangzhou cuisine.

the formation of Yangzhou's food culture

the ancestors of Yangzhou had already broken away from the ignorance of eating and drinking blood as early as about 4111 years ago. In 468 BC, Fu Cha, the king of Wu, destroyed the ancient Han kingdom, dug the Han ditch and built the Han city, which was of epoch-making value not only to Yangzhou urban construction but also to Yangzhou cooking. The record of "King Wu Guan's pot" used as a wine paddle in Zhou Li and the "Tao Ge with hard prints" unearthed from the Golden Dam in the northwest of the city show that Fu Cha introduced a whole set of dietary experience in the late Spring and Autumn Period. This is the first work that foreign food culture has influenced Yangzhou cooking. The dispute between the seven heroes in the Warring States period led to the return of Yangzhou cuisine to Chu, and Yangzhou cuisine strode to the realm of civilization, winning the title of "Huaiyang flavor in East Chu". After the Qin Dynasty, Liu Bi, the king of Wu in the Western Han Dynasty, built Guangling, the capital of Yangzhou, and became the capital of southeast China. Because the country is strong and the people are rich, they naturally don't feel hungry, so they eat well and eat well. The bronze tripod, bowls, plates, pots and other lacquered eating utensils unearthed from Yangzhou are very elegant, which reflects the exquisite diet of Yangzhou people at that time. In the Sui Dynasty, Yangzhou cooking made a second-to-none leap in the world! Thanks to one person-Emperor Yangdi. The ancient canal connects the five water systems of the sea, the Yellow River, the Huai River and the Qian River, and immediately promotes Yangzhou to the position of the national hub for the exchange of cooking talents, skills and raw materials. The beans, wheat and miscellaneous grains in the north go south, and the grain, tea, fruit, salt and aquatic products in the south go north, all of which will be stationed in Yangcheng. Emperor Yangdi, on the other hand, was fortunate in Jiangdu, and brought the Central Plains cuisines from Chang 'an and Luoyang with the dragon boat into the Sui Palace in Yangcheng, and then spread them abroad. By the Tang Dynasty, Yangzhou had developed into a southeast economic center. It's very important to have a three-point bright moon in the world, and Yangzhou accounts for two points! "Every merchant meets his wife at sunset, and the spring breeze and wine in one city merge." Yangzhou's food market has been stimulated to be hot, and its cooking skills are superb. The excavation of Yangzhou marine fish fossils in the Tang Dynasty demonstrates that cooking materials have advanced from livestock, poultry, river fresh and wild vegetables to seafood! Yangzhou's delicious food attracted great attention of the royal family and became a first-class tribute. When Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty and Yang Guifei appeased An Lushan and gave gifts to the palace, among them was Yangzhou's "golden spoon with a flat nose". All these factors have made Yangzhou develop to a new peak. In 1125 A.D., when the Jin people invaded, Song Huizong fled to Yangzhou City in a panic, and the collision between the North and South styles of cuisines finally broke out in Yangzhou. Emperor Gaozong and 41,111 members of the royal family also fled into Yangzhou City. Although Yangzhou City was plundered in the end, it is also true that the catering industry was abnormally promoted under the background of national subjugation. During the Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, especially in the prosperous period of Kangxi and Qianlong, Huaiyang cuisine entered the second climax. Kangxi and Qianlong visited the south, and Yangzhou cuisine was even more grand. According to "Yangzhou Painting Boat Record", "Before and after Shangshang Street, the temples were all big kitchens, in case the boss had a hundred lawsuits to eat and drink." The intervention of literati was the catalyst for Yangzhou cuisine to reach its peak in the middle of Qing Dynasty. Literature has been involved in Yangzhou cuisine since Han Fu, Tang Poetry and Song Poetry, but especially in the Qing Dynasty, now we can enjoy at least 211 poems about the history of eating, picking materials, eating dishes, banquets, cooking, restaurants, eating customs and drinking, which makes Huaiyang cuisine more elegant and greatly enhances the cultural taste. After the founding of New China, especially in the more than 21 years since the reform and opening up, the story of spring has been sung everywhere in Yangzhou cuisine. The contemporary Huaiyang cuisine, marked by the banquet in the Red Mansion, has pushed food culture, food science and food art to a new commanding height with newer, greater momentum, more sophisticated skills and more beautiful pursuit!

the characteristics of Yangzhou food culture

Mr. Feng Qiyong, president of China Red Society, wrote: "The delicacies in the world belong to Yangzhou, and three sets of ducks stew silver carp heads. A new banquet was held in the Red Chamber last night, and Kyushu was gluttonous. " Zhang Qijun, a famous gourmet in Taiwan Province, once predicted that "the prosperity of 1,411 years will eventually make Yangzhou the center of life enjoyment in the south; Its dishes have become representatives of southern cuisine. " Yangzhou diet is divided into two parts: Yangzhou cuisine and Yangzhou snacks.

the main characteristics of Yangzhou cuisine are: strict selection of materials, meticulous knife work, prominent main ingredients, attention to the original taste, attention to fire work, good at stewing, clear and mellow soup, thick but not greasy, light and tender, unique shape, salty and slightly sweet, suitable for both north and south. Yangzhou chef is good at food carving. Yangzhou cuisine is represented by Yangzhou Santou: the Red Mansion Banquet, the Santou Banquet and the Whole Lotus Root Banquet are the three pearls of Yangzhou cuisine.

The banquet in the Red Mansion is an innovation of dishes written in A Dream of Red Mansions. Cao Xueqin, the author, stayed in Yangzhou for a long time, and his grandfather, Cao Yin, gave a banquet in honor of Liusibai Palace when he went to Yangzhou to pick up Emperor Kangxi. Feng Qiyong, a famous redologist, said: Honglou cuisine is really a system of Yangzhou cuisine.

Three-head banquet is a banquet developed from three traditional famous dishes in Yangzhou: braised silver carp head, stewed lion head and roasted pig head. Lion's head, fat and tender, not greasy; Silver carp head, mellow taste; The whole pig's head is full of fragrance, all of which have strong local flavor.

All-lotus banquet, known as Zeguo, a water town, and Baoying, a hometown of lotus roots, has created more than 51 kinds of lotus root dishes to form a unique all-lotus root banquet according to the ancestral cooking methods. This dish introduced by Baoying Hotel has been welcomed and praised by Chinese and foreign guests.

Yangzhou cuisine not only keeps the original Huaiyang three-headed banquet, Fuchun steamed stuffed bun and roasted tail banquet, but also innovates a series of dishes, such as Qionghua banquet, seafood banquet, chrysanthemum crab banquet, game banquet, eight strange banquet, palace banquet, Qianlong imperial banquet, vegetarian banquet, hot pot series and so on. Its special dishes are boiled dried silk, crossing the bridge with generals, sweet-sour mandarin fish and three sets of ducks. To taste authentic special dishes, it is most affordable to go to Yangzhou's time-honored brand. The taste is not only authentic, but also relatively moderate in price. You can also go to hotels and restaurants or Yangzhou gourmet street and other places.

Let's take a look at the snacks in Yangzhou. The snacks in Yangzhou usually refer to the cold dishes, fried dishes and seats other than big dishes, popular snacks and snacks and foods made by the people. Yangzhou snacks are mainly tender yeast, warm dough, crisp cakes, noodles and seasonal snacks. Dim sum is good at thin skin and big stuffing, suitable combination of skin and stuffing, changeable stuffing and adapting to the season. Noodles are glutinous and tough, with multiple soups, covered with various toppings and delicious. Flavor snacks are mostly made of seasonal wild vegetables with meat and meat, preserved fruits and preserves, which change with the seasons. Dim sum seasoning tends to be fresh, crisp and highlight the main flavor. Salty with sweetness, fresh with sweetness; The sweetness is sticky and smooth, sweet and pure, and it has the characteristics of rich and affordable northern dim sum and fine and colorful southern dim sum, with unified shape and quality and exquisite materials, forming its own characteristics.

ten famous points are: three-dimensional steamed buns, thousand-layer oil cakes, double sesame crisp cakes, jade steamed buns, dried vegetable buns, wild duck steamed buns, glutinous rice steamed buns, steamed dumplings with crab roe, roasted pork chops and shredded chicken rolls.

The top ten flavor snacks are: bamboo shoot fried dumpling, Yangzhou cake, crab shell yellow, fried eggs, salty pot cake, radish crisp cake, shredded chicken, three fresh pot cake, sweet-scented osmanthus sugar lotus root porridge and three-color oil dumplings.

The top ten special snacks are: Sixi dumplings, raw lotus root clips, tofu rolls, bamboo shoots, Chidou Yuanxiao, Wuren cakes, scallion crispy cakes, Huangqiao sesame cakes, shrimp dumpling noodles and bamboo shoots wonton.

These famous dishes can be tasted in almost every street of Yangzhou cuisine. In addition, some time-honored brands also offer various snacks.

Due to the rich and colorful culinary arts in China and different understandings, there is still no consensus on how many cuisines there are in China, but Huaiyang cuisine is among the four cuisines (Shandong cuisine, Sichuan cuisine, Guangdong cuisine and Huaiyang cuisine) and eight cuisines (Beijing cuisine, Shandong cuisine, Huaiyang cuisine, Jiangsu and Zhejiang cuisine, Fujian cuisine, Guangdong cuisine, Sichuan cuisine and hubei cuisine). This is enough to show the historical origin of Huaiyang cuisine and its influence in the whole country and even overseas! Huaiyang cuisine has become one of the four major cuisines for a long time, and its development process is essentially a process of continuous innovation. On the basis of excavating and developing the characteristic dishes of this cuisine and maintaining its own traditional craftsmanship, it also absorbs the advantages and strengths of various cuisines in a large number, and constantly improves and optimizes its own cooking techniques for our use, thus introducing new varieties of colors. Society is advancing, culture is developing, and life is changing. Facing the increasingly fierce market competition, Huaiyang cuisine should certainly keep pace with the times. On the basis of maintaining its traditional characteristics, it should constantly increase its innovation, adapt to colorful life, meet various needs, rebuild its merits for the development of Yangzhou, and add luster to the catering industry in China.