Bird's nests are nests made by swallows, but these swallows are not the ones we commonly see nesting under the eaves. Those under the eaves are called house swallows (swallows), which belong to the family of swallows, and their nests are made of grass or mud mixed with saliva, which makes them inedible and of little nutritional value. The edible bird's nests are made by another kind of swiftlet, which belongs to the swiftlet family and is called "swiftlet", which refers to the nests made by the saliva secreted by some of the swiftlets in the family Rainbird family and several species of swiftlets in the genus Apodidae, mixed with other substances (e.g. feathers), rather than the nests made by birds in the bird family of the order Sparidae, such as the house swallow. The nests are not made by birds of the family Sparidae (e.g., house swallows). The protein purity and nutritional value of swiftlet saliva is the highest. Bird's nests are produced in the coastal areas of southern China, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. Bird's nests are categorized into "House Swallows" and "Cave Swallows" according to their nesting places. The nests of "House Swallows" are usually built on bird's nests that are carefully constructed by hand to facilitate the collection of bird's nests, while the nests of "Cave Swallows" are built in caves, which is a dangerous place to collect bird's nests because of the steep terrain. Some bird's nests are called "blood bird's nests" because the swiftlet's food contains seaweeds and other substances that make its saliva red with impurities, not because people misunderstand that it has not completed its nest and spits out blood to prevent it from laying eggs. After the bird's nest is harvested, it has to go through complicated processing such as steaming, soaking, removing impurities, picking hairs and drying before it can be made into finished bird's nests, including marigolds, bird's nest bars, bird's nest cakes and bird's nest threads. Bird's nests are made by removing impurities and retaining the original shape of the entire bird's nest, which is particularly expensive. Golden Swallow's Nest. Most of them are built on the cliffs of tropical and subtropical islands, with rolling waves below the cliffs and blue sky and white clouds above. Swiftlets start to make nests in the spring, its mouth can secrete a kind of gelatinous saliva, spit out by the sea breeze blowing dry, it becomes semi-transparent and slightly light yellow material, which is the main ingredient of the bird's nest. The swiftlet uses this saliva to make a nest with delicate seaweeds, down feathers and soft plant fibers, which is what we call "bird's nest". Bird's nest is a precious delicacy, but also valuable medicinal herbs, have the effect of tonifying the lungs and nourishing the yin, the main treatment of deficiency cough, coughing up blood and other diseases. It is produced in India, Malay Archipelago, Hainan Island and South China Sea Islands.
Bird's nest is a good idea to eat less and more often, keep eating regularly, 3-5 grams of dried bird's nest each time, 20-30 grams of edible bird's nest each time, once in the morning and once in the evening, or once every day or every other day. Bird's nests should be eaten with "clear with clear, soft with soft." Generally speaking, during the period of consuming bird's nest, one should eat less spicy and oily food, and not smoke or smoke less. Do not consume bird's nest during cold and flu as the body cannot absorb the nutrients from bird's nest well.
1. Stewing bird's nest
The simplest way to soak and stew bird's nest is to soak and stew it in a bowl of pure water (about 10 grams of 300 ml of pure water) according to the different varieties of bird's nests and at different times (4-8 hours for first class white bird's nests and first class white bird's nest strips). Do not pour out the water of soaked bird's nest. After stewing, it can be served with rock sugar, milk, honey, soymilk and so on. To stew bird's nest, you need a stewing pot and a pot that can fit into the whole stewing pot. A ceramic or stainless steel pot can be used. Drain the soaked and cleaned bird's nests and put them in the stewing pot, add an appropriate amount of hot water to cover it, then put the whole stewing pot into the pot and fill it with hot water, the water level should be half of the height of the stewing pot, and then stew it over a slow fire. The control of fire at home stewed bird's nest, you can choose the method of slow simmering across the water, and the specific simmering time with the soaking time also has a relationship, such as soaking for a long time, you can correspondingly reduce the time of simmering. Generally speaking, it takes 30-45 minutes for the bird's nest to be stewed.
2. Preserving Bird's Nest
Bird's nest is a precious fluid secreted by swallows, and just like any other food, it needs to be stored properly. The ideal way is to store the bird's nest in a sealed bird's nest preservation box before storing it in the refrigerator. If the bird's nests get wet, they can be dried in air-conditioning, not baked or dried in the sun. Good bird's nests should be 10 times or above. The 5-8 times of bird's nests in the market have gone through artificial processes such as crushing and hanging, which not only increase the beauty of the bird's nests, but also increase the weight of the bird's nests by about 30%.
3. Origin
Bird's nest, as the name suggests, is the nest of a swallow. However, it is not an ordinary swallow's nest, but the nest of a special kind of swallow, the swiftlet. The swiftlet belongs to the bird family, Apodidae. It is a migratory bird that flies from Siberia to the natural caves along the tropical coast from December to March every year to breed. The swiftlet is smaller than the swallows we usually see, with grayish-brown back feathers with golden luster, pointed and long wings, and four toes growing forward. This swallow has a well-developed mucus gland in its throat, and the saliva it secretes can be condensed into a solid in the air, which is the main material for them to build their nests. Swiftlets lay eggs in March and April every year. Before laying eggs, they fly in the sea and high altitude every day, sometimes up to thousands of meters, through the clouds and fog, sucking the rain and dew, ingesting insects, seaweed, silverfish and other things. After digestion, they burrowed into the deep cracks and caves of precipitous, cool, and high-altitude cliffs to spit and build their nests. It takes about 20 days to build the nest. Bird's Nests in Bird Houses
Bird's nests are half-moon shaped, shaped like human ears, with a diameter of 6-7 centimeters, a thick base and a thin wall, weighing about 10-15 grams. The outer part of the nest is neat and tidy, while the inner part is rough, like a loofah network. The whole bird's nest is white, crystalline and elastic, attached to the rocky cliffs. It has been known as "rare and famous medicine" and "Oriental treasures". The first nests built by swiftlets are made of a large amount of mucus secreted from their throats and gradually condensed into a pure texture with no hair attached, which is the best quality among all bird's nests. In the feudal imperial era, it was often chosen as the tribute to be offered, hence the name "Official Bird's Nest". After the bird's nest collector seized the opportunity to take away the bird's nest, the swiftlet had to make the nest for the second time, because of the pro-egg-laying period is close, the swiftlet is full-bodied, the throat gelatinous material is more, the nest is more fat, but because of the time constraints, they bring in the feathers and grasses. ...... However, due to time constraints, they bring in feathers, grass and throat gelatinous material to build nests again, which is relatively rough and contains more impurities and poorer nutrient content. The bird's nest harvested at this time is called "Hairy Bird's Nest". There is another kind of bird's nest that is moisturized by the red liquid seeping out from the red rock wall, and the whole body becomes dark red, also known as "Blood Swallow" or "Red Swallow", which contains a number of minerals, good nutrition, and very little production, and is regarded as the precious bird's nest. Climbing up the rock wall to collect bird's nests is a very hard and dangerous labor. The collectors carry a bag on their backs and climb between the steep cliffs, like monkeys stepping on the hollows, picking at the cracks and searching around for the collection. They are as light as a swallow, bold as an eagle, and sometimes their hands and feet are in the shape of a "big", attached to the rock wall; sometimes with the help of ropes such as swinging in the canyon. Every move, the heartstrings, in case of loss, fell into the ravine, to be shattered. So the bird's nest of expensive, in addition to its own really have nourishing effect, there are also collection of life-threatening factors within it.
4. Role
1, tonifying the lungs and nourishing the yin, stopping lung deficiency coughing, and reducing lung gas lesions. Including lung yin deficiency of asthma, shortness of breath, prolonged cough, blood in sputum, coughing up blood, hemoptysis, bronchitis, sweating, low-grade fever. 2, tonifying deficiency and nourishing the stomach, stopping stomach coldness, vomiting. Stomach Yin deficiency caused by regurgitation, dry vomiting, intestinal sounds. 3, Where weakness after illness, consumption, loss of vitality, with bird's nest for food, can nourish yin and regulate the middle. 4, Stop sweating, excessive sweating, frequent urination, nocturia of deficiency of qi and spleen. 5、It makes one's skin smooth, elastic and glossy, thus reducing wrinkles. 6, bird's nest contains many kinds of amino acids, infants and children often eat can grow wisdom, increase thinking, anti-sensitivity, make up for the shortage of its successive days. 7, Pregnant women during pregnancy, prenatal and postnatal food, it has the effect of stabilizing and replenishing the fetus. 8, Bird's nest contains many kinds of amino acids, which can inhibit and counteract esophageal cancer, pharyngeal cancer, gastric cancer, liver cancer, rectal cancer, etc.
Classification of Bird's Nest
1.Nesting Location
According to the nesting location of swiftlet, it can be classified into Cave Swiftlet and House Swiftlet.
Cave Swallows: Swallows make their nests in caves and coastal cliffs in the wild. Due to the unorganized and indiscriminate mining and digging in the early days, the living environment of the swiftlet has been damaged, and now only the bamboo ladder used in the past is left in some of the swiftlet caves in Thailand, and the swallows have long been few and far between, and as the production of Cave Swallows is scarce, and environmental protection is becoming more and more important, it is gradually being replaced by the Roof Swallows. Roof Swallows: From Cave Swallows to Roof Swallows, the swiftlets only change their nesting environment, but their living habits do not change. The swiftlets are still wild, they go out to forage for food early in the morning and return in the evening, and due to the man-made protection of the swiftlets, they multiply more and more, and the nests built by the swiftlets are picked in time, so that the nutrients will not be lost, and the quality of the bird's nests is better than that of the Cave Swallows. The original house bird's nest combines the advantages of both "House Bird's Nest" and "Hole Bird's Nest". The natural virgin forest environment and the "House Bird's Nest" technology have effectively solved the internal and external environmental problems of the bird's nest quality, resulting in a unique and original house bird's nest, which is natural, fresh, clean and other advantages in one.
2. By color
Blood Swallow, Yellow Swallow, White Swallow. Bird's Nest
4. According to the form of production
Grass Bird's Nest: the body is smaller, thumb-sized, and the flight range is small, the grass bird's nest texture is poor, some grass bird's nests have nylon grasses inside them which is actually due to the inability of the gelatinous bag to be digested. High quality grass swallows are dominated by bird's nest silk, while low quality grass swallows have impurities and granular objects with rough texture. Grass swallows are a kind of wild swallows, which have a strong ability to adapt to various environments. They are used to pick up grass silk and spit out their saliva to build their nests. When the grass shreds and saliva condense, the nest becomes a shelter for raising the next generation. Therefore, the nests built by this species of swiftlet are covered with grass clippings. Therefore, it is easier to recognize a grass swallow nest than other types of swiftlet nests, basically, "where there is grass, there is a bird's nest". This type of swiftlet is more common in the southern part of the Philippines around the Sulu Sea, so it is also known as the Philippine Grass Swallow. Hairy Bird's Nest: Bird's nests that are picked directly without any treatment, with a lot of swiftlet's feathers mixed in, so it is called Hairy Bird's Nest. There is a difference between Hairy Bird's Nest and the high quality House Bird's Nest which is just picked with a few feathers, both in the swiftlet houses and in the wild, the difference is very great, the light Hairy Bird's Nest can be turned into swiftlet blocks and strips after de-feathering, while the heavy Hairy Bird's Nest can not be detached from the strips of meat, so in the past, it was used to be eaten by stockings wrapped with dissolved bird's nests in a pot, but nowadays, they are broken up and de-feathered again to add the work of swiftlet cakes or broken up. Bird's nests with fewer impurities, even if they are hairy, but not processed with chemicals are good bird's nests.
5. According to the shape
The complete bird's nest is clean, with few impurities and good color after the hair picking process. According to the completeness of the marigold, white swiftlet marigolds can be classified into different grades, among which Premium White Bird's Nest (Dragon's Tooth) is the best grade - large and perfect marigold shape with tight fibers; there are also Triangle Bird's Nests, which are triangular in shape and are nests of Golden Swallow that are built in the corners of the swiftlet houses. Bird's Nest Strips Bird's nests with thick strips are called "Bird's Nest Strips" because many of the intact bird's nests are crushed during the process of picking, packing or transportation and cannot be formed into the shape of a marigold. The taste of swiftlet sticks is slightly worse than that of bird's nests, but the nutritional value is the same. Due to the fact that there is no marigold shape to speak of, the price is lower than that of bird's nests, so the price of swiftlet sticks is lower than that of marigolds. Bird's Nest
Shredded Bird's Nest Shredded Bird's Nest is the thin stripes that come off when the workers pick the hairs, and then pack them after concentration, so it is called "shredded bird's nest" because of its broken shape. The taste of bird's nest is worse than that of bird's nest and bird's bar, it is very broken after stewing and has more impurities than bird's nest; the price is lower, so it can satisfy the demand of low-priced consumer groups. There are also bird's nests, bird's balls, bird's nuggets and chopped bird's nests made from bird's threads, which are mostly synthesized by using some edible glue in the processing, so the price is also lower. Bird's Nest When trimming the bird's nest, the irregular part of the corner of the bird's nest is trimmed down and is in the shape of a horn, so it is called the bird's nest horn. Since the horn is the corner of the bird's nest, it is harder and chewier, but the hair head is smaller and the soaking time is longer, usually more than 10 hours.
Edit Section 3: Production Process
The production process of bird's nest is a learning process. The bird's nest will be very different when soaked in different varieties of bird's nests, chefs, seasonal humidity, room temperature, water temperature, and even morning and evening. The following are some of the methods:
1. Alkaline Hair
(Old style hair method, not recommended). Soak the bird's nest in warm water, then rinse with clean water two or three times (pay attention to keep the form neat), then soak in cool water; pour away the water before use, mix and blend the bird's nest with lye, generally 50 grams of bird's nest with 1.5 grams of lye (bird's nests, such as the older, can be used for 2.5 grams), and add boiled water to mention; to the bird's nest rises, pour half of the lye, and then use boiled water to mention three or four times to the expansion to three times of the original, the feeling of the hand twisting is soft and astringent, and the pinch will be broken. That is; then rinse off the alkaline surface, soak into the cool water to be used. Into the cooking with a dry cloth to absorb the water can be.
2. Evaporation
Also known as the cage, steamer. Is a means of cooking the raw materials of the initial cooked, not as a method of cooking dishes. After the initial processing of the net material with steam steaming, to break the degree of raw, semi-cooked or just cooked, for the cooking of dishes to reduce time. First, soak the bird's nest in 50℃ water, until the water cools down, then soak it in 70℃ water, until it swells up and then take it out, protect it from breaking, change the water and rinse it twice, put it into 80℃ water and scald it, clean it and load it into a bowl, steam it over a low fire until it becomes loose and soft and sticky.
3. soaking
Also known as dip hair, hair material. Water as a solvent to help hair, the dry material will be immersed to swell, fluffy, tender for formal cooking. Dry raw materials to re-inhale water, can maximize the recovery of the original tender, fluffy state. Water hair according to the water temperature can be divided into: 1. cold water hair (or warm water hair). Also known as dip hair, bleaching hair. The water temperature is usually around 40℃, room temperature in summer and warm water in winter. Bird's nest soaked in cold water for two hours, fished out and picked feathers, impurities, and then put into a pot of boiling water, covered with a lid to simmer for about 30 minutes, such as not yet soft Processing process
soft, can be replaced with boiling water and then simmer for 30 minutes, because there is a simmering process in the cooking process, so can not be hair enough to prevent simmering over the top of the rotting, the loss of stripes and soft texture to the time to be applicable to the fished, soak into the cool water to be used. Before using, blanch into a pot of boiling water for about 2 minutes before cooking. This method is suitable for soup dishes. 2. hot water hair (recommended for emergency use). Also known as soaking hair, cooking hair, stewing hair. Bird's nest dry material will be immersed in hot water, through heating, increase the penetration rate of water molecules, promote the full expansion of the dried bird's nest material, in order to achieve the effect of rising hair with room temperature water is difficult to achieve. When making bird's nests, the water and tools used for rising bird's nests should be clean and not stained with oil, otherwise it will affect the quality of making bird's nests. Bird's nest can be cooked in soup, both sweet and salty, or braised and mixed. When making salty dishes, it should be noted that it is better to be clear rather than thick, and it is better to be pure rather than mixed. Because of its own little flavor, it should be modulated with soup, or with fresh ingredients, with meat as much as possible with clean meat, not thick and greasy. It should also be noted that bird's nest is soft or tender in texture, and the ingredients should be matched more smoothly than inversely. Bird's nest dishes are available in various cuisines, and there are many varieties, all of which are used as the main dish of a banquet.
1. The secret of buying beautiful bird's nest
First, the place of origin should be fixed: there are as many as 28 types of bird's nests, so if you want to buy bird's nests of the same kind every time, you must know that they are all from the same place of origin (e.g. Sumatra, Indonesia), and only in this way can you process them at the same cooking time and get the same taste of the bird's nests. Bird's Nest Gift Box Secondly, the hairiness of the bird's nest: Different types of bird's nests have different hairiness ("hairiness" is the difference between the weight of the bird's nest when it is wet and the weight of the bird's nest when it is dry, and the greater the multiplier, the better the hairiness, and the better the quality of the bird's nest. The larger the multiplier, the better the "hair head" and the more durable the bird's nest is), generally, the Government Bird's Nest has 6 to 8 times of "hair head". Thirdly, see if the bird's nest is clean: the less fine hairs, the better. Fourth, pick the type of bird's nest: the finer the head and foot of the bird's nest, the better. Fifth, see if the bird's nest is dry and light: dry and light with little water is the best. High quality bird's nests should be dry to the touch. Wetter bird's nests have more water and will become moldy if not stored properly.
2. Non-laboratory Identification of Bird's Nest Points
1. Look: Bird's nest has a filamentous structure in the middle, and the bird's nest horn is a flaky structure; pure bird's nest, whether soaked in water or viewed under the light, is not completely transparent, but translucent. 2. Smell: Bird's nest has unique fragrance, but no strong odor. Touch: Take a small piece of bird's nest and soak it in water, soften it and then take the silk strip and pull it, the elasticity is poor, and the one that breaks when you pull it is a fake; rub it with your fingers, and the one that has no elasticity and can be rubbed into a paste is also a fake. But completely hair open after no elasticity, if there is still very good elasticity that is false. 4. Burning: When dry bird's nest slices are ignited with fire, there are sparks flying, which is the result of protein combustion, and the ash is black, not the misleading white ash on the internet.
3. Defend the authenticity
1. The weight of a single bird's nest is more than 8 grams, and the weight of a single bird's nest of high quality is about 3.4-8 grams; 2. There is no oil stains or mucus after soaking in the water of the real bird's nest; 3. The shape of the real bird's nest is in the form of a silky strip after cooking, with varying lengths, thicknesses and irregularities, or in the form of a lump; 4. There is a faint proteinaceous smell after cooking the real bird's nest; 5. Fishy smell of protein; 5, the real bird's nest after cooking taste smooth; 6, the real bird's nest after cooking color is light milky yellow, not too white and translucent.
4. Identification
The difference between good and bad bird's nests lies in six major indicators: origin, hair, completeness, cleanliness, taste
Bird's nests can be found in a variety of ways, including