When I first heard the dish of shredded pork with fish flavor, I thought it was a dish made of shredded fish, but when I saw the pork tenderloin cut in the dish, I couldn't help thinking: Where did the fish go?

I believe I'm not the only one who made this joke when I was a child. This dish with a strange name but good taste has caused me great interests. After looking up many materials about Sichuan cuisine, I realized that fish-flavored shredded pork is actually a traditional dish in Sichuan cuisine, and the characteristics of this fish-flavored series of dishes are that they can make similar fish flavors according to several kinds of condiments (such as bean paste, pickled peppers, soy sauce, chicken essence, vinegar, sugar, etc.) without fish.

Fish-flavored series dishes happened not long ago, and they are the material after modern times in China. According to the records in Sichuan Annals, the fish-flavored shredded pork was invented by Sichuan chefs in 1911, which was the third year of Xuantong, but the specific key points are no longer available.

one thing is clear, however, by the Republic of China, Sichuan cuisine with Sichuan flavor series products had gradually spread all over the country, and Zhang Henshui, a writer who wrote classic novels "Golden Powder Family" and "Crying and Laughing", was a loyal fan of Sichuan cuisine with fish-flavored shredded pork. Then, how can Sichuan cuisine's fish flavor series dishes taste like fish without fish?

what is the taste of fish? This may be difficult to describe in text, but ancient people have already expressed their understanding of fish flavor in one word, that is: fish, sheep and fresh. Different from the five flavors of sweet, sour, bitter and spicy, umami is a kind of flavor that can't be actually described, but it can make people's stomachs extremely excited. Therefore, thousands of diners have always pursued perfection for umami.

In fact, the smell of fish in Sichuan cuisine is a delicious taste in essence. In ancient times, soy sauce and chicken essence were not widely used, and everyone's understanding of umami was limited. Therefore, when Sichuan chefs made a unique umami childhood with sauerkraut and Pixian bean paste for the first time, everyone simply crowned it with fish flavor. Because it is not spicy, sour, salty or sweet, it is a delicious taste that excites the taste.

some people here may want to say, even if it's fish and sheep, why do people think of only fish and no sheep? This is because the ancient people's dietary taste is constantly changing. In previous years, beef was the primary meat product of many Central Plains people, but after the Song Dynasty, everyone's primary meat product gradually became raw pork, and in the Tang Dynasty, many cooking techniques about beef gradually died out, which made beef withdraw from the popular specialty food team. Therefore, in the late Qing Dynasty, everyone's mastery and imagination of umami only left fish, and the fish flavor came from it.

Modern science and technology have made a comprehensive analysis of umami flavor. In addition to the sodium glutamate in chicken essence, there are actually many carbohydrates, which can make people experience umami flavor, and this umami flavor can promote each other to some extent. In other words, if two different news features are mixed with each other, it will have 1+1 >: The actual effect of 2.

The umami flavor of fish flavor is closely related to the rise of two seasonings, namely bean paste and pickled pepper. The production process of both of them coincides with each other, which is also the specific origin of the umami flavor of ancient people.

Whether it is a green plant or a small animal, it is difficult for people to feel the umami flavor when they take it immediately. However, when the protein is converted into carbohydrates in the human digestive system, it has already passed the link of tongue taste and taste. However, the fermentation of seasoning just brings this whole process forward. According to the flora, the protein of ingredients is transformed into various carbohydrates in advance, including the umami chemicals that people often say. At the moment, when people take this kind of ingredients, it is very easy to taste the delicious taste in them, and bean paste and pickled peppers are among them.

Different from the soy sauce commonly used by people, the characteristic of bean paste is that cowpea is used as the raw material, and at the same time, it enters the pepper in the morning to develop alcohol, thus forming a distinctive taste different from the northeast soy sauce.

Like soybean, cowpea contains abundant protein, which is also converted into various carbohydrates in the whole process of anaerobic fermentation, thus resulting in a unique umami flavor. Some Sichuan chefs like to add bean paste in cooking to improve the umami flavor of food, which is also one of the ways to make fish flavor.

In addition, people in Sichuan also found the origin of umami flavor from local pickled vegetables, especially pickled peppers, in which edible salt and pure grain wine were added to fresh Chaotian peppers for wet fermentation (lactic acid fermentation was carried out by using lactic acid bacteria drinks in low-concentration edible salt aqueous solution). In the 196s, there were many Sichuan cuisine recipes, and many Sichuan-flavored dishes could be seen with pickled peppers.

It can also be very well expressed that the fish flavor is equivalent to the umami flavor. Why do many Sichuan-flavored dishes have different seasonings? Take the most traditional fish-flavored shredded pork as an example, there is a great objection to using bean paste or pickled peppers as seasoning.

In fact, this is a choice of both. Even today, when monosodium glutamate is widely used, you can make a good fish flavor without both, which is actually delicious. There is no need to worry about which is the pure fish flavor, because it is just a milestone for the ancients to pursue perfection of umami.

Thanks to the development of Sichuan cuisine in the modern history of the world, the fish flavor is not limited to shredded pork with fish flavor. A series of fish-flavored dishes, such as fish-flavored eggplant cake, Sichuan-flavored liver slices, eight pieces of chicken with fish flavor, Sichuan-flavored shredded rice and fish-flavored scrambled eggs, have made the fish flavor not only a vital part of Sichuan cuisine, but also a favorite of thousands of diners. From the smell of fish to the freshness, everyone's pursuit of perfection in delicious food has never changed since ancient times.