When I was a child, I was most looking forward to the Chinese New Year holiday. A very important reason is that families can stop their busy steps through festivals, and everyone can sit around and cook all kinds of pasta.
For example, long summer makes flat cakes, and Tomb-Sweeping Day makes clear fruits. Zongzi is made on the Dragon Boat Festival, and Tangyuan or jiaozi is made in the first month. There are also relatives who want to make ruler cakes when making beams. The Spring Festival is even more unambiguous. jiaozi and jiaozi are all in battle, making a big fuss.
Jiaozi cooked by our family generally includes bean paste, leek, shredded radish and pickles. Like I have loved sweets since I was a child, my favorite is naturally bean paste stuffing.
Every time I see grandma cooking red beans, filtering bean paste and cooking bean paste on the stove, I am so greedy that I ask grandma to give me some to taste from time to time.
The happiest thing is that after wrapping jiaozi, there will always be some red bean paste left in the basin. My aunt often asks me to lick the basin at this time. Actually, my aunt didn't shout, and I'm ready to rush over at any time. I scraped the bean paste on the basin wall spoon by spoon, and it was very sweet in my mouth, and my heart was very satisfied.
Now that I think about it, that time was really beautiful and long. If I go back to that time, I should still be so looking forward to and satisfied.
There are many unforgettable pasta in my hometown. Because I love eating, I will be particularly impressed by anything related to pasta, even the details.
For example, wheat cake, even in my hometown, is a kind of cake that few people will make, but it is firmly imprinted in my memory.
The first time I ate wheat cake, it was given by my grandmother next door. This grandmother is my grandfather's sister-in-law, and she is 90 years old this year. She is hale and hearty, her face is red, and she is very clever except that she is a little hard of hearing.
Grandma walks to the village by herself every day, and then goes to town to buy food by car. Crabs, hooves, flat peaches and apricots, bring back whatever you want to eat today.
Not that grandma has money. On the contrary, she has no fixed income. She relies on her children to give her some pocket money every day, or sell vegetables and eggs to earn some money for ordering food.
She often says that she has no other hobbies, but likes to drink some old wine and eat some dishes she likes.
Grandma can not only eat, but also be handy. Flat peach sauce, sesame sauce, red bean rice, sweet and salty glutinous rice balls, liqueur, these things can make my mouth water, and they are also ordinary snacks of my mother-in-law's family in the 1990s when material life was not plentiful.
I remember that in the spring when I was 7 years old, the rape flowers in my hometown could be harvested. One night, I was at my grandmother's house, playing with two cousins. I heard that they were going to cut rapeseed the next day, and everyone got a reward of 50 cents. I am also eager to join.
The next day, we three children followed the grandmother and her adults all day. When I went home for dinner at night, my grandmother came to my house with hot wheat cakes, saying that I had worked hard today and rewarded me with wheat cakes and fifty cents. I jumped up happily on the spot, which was the first time I had ever worked. Compared with fifty cents, that piece of wheat cake filled with rich bean flavor and sugar flavor moved me more. I can still recall the soft and sweet taste that melts in my mouth. In the current buzzwords, taste belongs to the healing system.
The experience of tasting wheat cake for the first time is unparalleled. Since then, I have been looking forward to tasting grandma's wheat cakes in spring. Seeing that I am so obsessed with a wheat cake, my mother finally made me a delicious wheat cake ten years later to satisfy my taste buds.
Wheat cakes are seasonal snacks and can only be made after green beans are on the market. Broad beans are grown at home every year. Tender beans are usually used to make scallion beans, and slightly older ones are used to make wheat cakes, because if you want to mix them with flour, beans that are too tender can't make a fragrance.
My mother is willing to make wheat cakes several times a year now, because it is easy and labor-saving.
First, peel the broad beans to get watercress, put them in a pot and cook them with water and sugar until they are rotten. Add more sugar, flour will dilute the sweetness. Turn off the heat after the watercress is cooked, and crush it slightly with a spatula, not into mud. Small pieces are better to eat, and the green watercress is boiling in the pot, and the heart is warm.
After the watercress is cooked, directly pour the flour into the pot and mix well with the watercress. The amount of flour can be caked with good flour, which is neither rotten nor hard. At this time, the watercress and flour become pale green.
After mixing the dough, knead it into wheat cake balls. Depending on personal preference, we usually knead it into an oval shape of about 15 cm, put it in a steamer with gauze or rice leaves, cook it with fire, and steam it for about 8 minutes after the water is boiled. If you are not at ease, you can insert dough with chopsticks. If you take it out, it means that the wheat cake is ripe.
Sweet wheat cake is light yellow and green after it is out of the pot, like a piece of nephrite. When the temperature drops, slice the wheat cake and plate it. If the temperature is high, the knife will stick when cutting.
When writing this article, I seem to smell something familiar. I wish I could put such a plate in front of me and let me swallow a few pieces freely. This kind of gluttony can be restored to childhood in minutes even when people reach middle age.
The memory of wheat cake is simple and beautiful, and the purest life scene of childhood is printed outside the food.
I think the word "wheat cake" will accompany me all my life.