What is the first dish that comes to your mind when you hear Sichuan cuisine?

The answer is "Twice-cooked pork, and then boiled cabbage." Recently, I extracted some opinions from three books: "Sichuan Cuisine Cooking Codex", "Sichuan Cuisine in Detail", and "Shark's Fin & Pepper", and talked about the history of Sichuan cuisine, the characteristics of Sichuan cuisine, and the types of Sichuan cuisine.

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(The reading time of the article is about 5 minutes) 1. Let’s talk about the history of Sichuan cuisine. Since ancient times, the history of Chinese cooking has a long history...from Yin Yi, who moved from the kitchen to the chef in the Shang Dynasty, to Yi Ya, who was good at cooking in the Spring and Autumn Period...from the Warring States Period "Lv

Lu Buwei from "Spring and Autumn Period·Original Flavor", to Sun Simiao who was proficient in dietary therapy in the Tang Dynasty...from Lu You who loved Sichuan food in the Southern Song Dynasty, to Li Shizhen who was a medicinal practitioner in the Ming Dynasty...not to mention Guo Moruo, Zhang Daqian and others in modern times.

Sichuan cuisine originated in the pre-Qin Dynasty, originated in the Northern Song Dynasty, and matured in the late Qing Dynasty. It also occupies a strong place in the history of cooking: 1) The Eastern Jin Dynasty, in "Huayang Guozhi", described the Sichuan people's food taste as "high in flavor and spicy."

"2) In the Northern Song Dynasty, Sichuan cuisine was introduced to the capital Tokyo (now Kaifeng), and restaurants specializing in Sichuan cuisine appeared.

3) In the late Qing Dynasty, Sichuan introduced the cultivation of peppers from South America, which truly formed its own characteristics in dishes.

2. Let’s talk about the characteristics of Sichuan cuisine. The first key word: “Taste” Food is in China, and taste is in Sichuan.

The taste of Sichuan cuisine is characterized by "diverse and changeable flavors".

This feature comes from the surrounding geographical seasoning endowment, such as Zhongba’s soy sauce, Langzhong’s vinegar, Pixian’s douban, and Zigong’s well salt... A good seasoning foundation brings various complex flavors: spicy, spicy, sour, and peppery.

, red oil, fish flavor, salty, sweet and sour, garlic paste and dozens of other flavors.

The second key word: "popularization" In the traditional development, China generally has four major local cuisines.

Palace cuisine in the north (Beijing cuisine, Shandong cuisine) literati cuisine (Huaiyang cuisine) in the east, merchant cuisine (Cantonese cuisine) in the south, and civilian cuisine (Sichuan cuisine) in the west. Among them, civilian Sichuan cuisine generally has three characteristics: 1) Local materials

2) Make the best use of everything 3) Mix meat and vegetables. For example, buy a radish, and use the radish skin to make kimchi and the radish heart to make the main dish; or slaughter a chicken and cook the chicken, chicken offal, and chicken wings separately, which can make the best use of everything.

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3. Let’s talk about the types of Sichuan cuisine. Sichuan cuisine is divided into three categories: banquet dishes, home-cooked dishes, and local snacks. It is different from imagination. The impression of Sichuan cuisine is very popular, but its banquet dishes are still a part of high-end state banquets.

Sichuan banquet dishes have their own unique characteristics: 1) high-end ingredients 2) generous dishes 3) attention to table presentation 4) cooking is mainly based on simmering, roasting, steaming, braising and stewing, with few stir-fry dishes 5) attention to specifications such as cold dishes

The number of meals ranges from "four single plates" to "nine-nine dishes to one". For example, eight dishes and one soup are divided into "four pillars" + "four rows of dishes" + "seat soup". According to the first dish, it is divided into bird's nest feast and shark's fin feast.

Banquets, seafood banquets, etc... The main dishes include boiled cabbage, snowflake chicken, Dadao golden noodles, pickled pepper and Liao ginseng. At present, restaurants such as Yuzhilan and Songyunze in Chengdu still use Sichuan style banquets.

As a daily meal, Sichuan home-cooked food has four characteristics: 1) strong taste 2) affordable price 3) quick delivery 4) mainly small portions It can be seen that home-cooked Sichuan food is close to people’s lives and full of local characteristics, so it is currently on the market

Most of the restaurants it operates serve Sichuan-style home cooking.

Sichuan-flavored local snacks are more derived from the old "food load" salesmen who carried food containers on their shoulders and hawked along the streets. Some loaded raw materials or semi-finished products at one end and carried the stove at the other.

Do sell now.

In the past, there were Zhong Wensen’s Zhong Shui Dumplings, Lai Yuanxin’s Lai Tangyuan, Husband and wife lung slices, dandan noodles, tofu nao, etc. Finally, a sentence from "Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper" summed it up: "Eating" itself is a matter of cultural belonging.