Steamed dumplings are the most famous traditional snack in Zhaoqing, Guangdong, and one of the most popular local specialties since ancient times. The main ingredients of the steamed rice dumplings are similar to other dumplings, mainly glutinous rice, pork, green beans, salted egg yolk, mushrooms, shrimp, scallop, chestnuts, peanuts, etc. The main difference between the steamed rice dumplings and the other dumplings is that the leaves of the rice dumplings are wrapped with the local special Shuusei leaves and watercress, and the steamed rice dumplings are relatively large.
The history of steamed rice dumplings has a long history, according to legend, in the Qin Dynasty, when the farmers in order to facilitate the work, they use bamboo or lotus leaves wrapped in rice, boiled and brought to the field as a dry food for labor, and later through continuous improvement and evolution, the formation of today's steamed rice dumplings. Zhaoqing people like to eat steamed rice dumplings, the production of this snack is also extremely elaborate.
When we were in Zhaoqing, we went to Aunt Liu's house in Xiaoyao Village, Mugang Street, Duanzhou District, Zhaoqing City, Guangdong Province, to learn more about the process of making steamed dumplings in a typical local family workshop.
Zhaoqing people make steamed rice dumplings, rice dumplings must be selected from the bright green leaves of Shuusei, the best glutinous rice and mung beans, and fat and thin fresh pork and other ingredients, ready to prepare the raw materials, the first to soak the glutinous rice and mung beans and mung beans, and peeled, and then add five spices and wine marinade pork, all the raw materials based on the processing is complete, can be wrapped in the rice dumplings.
Spread a few Shuusei leaves in the triangular mold, add two spoons of glutinous rice, then add a spoonful of mung beans and two pieces of pork in the middle, and finally add a few spoons of glutinous rice covered in the top, and finally wrapped wrapped thread, a dumpling is wrapped. And wrapped steam rice dumplings boil cooking takes a long time, usually have to open fire boil cooking nearly 8 hours, the dumplings will be fully cooked. So, to cook a pot of rice dumplings, usually have to stay up all night to finish.
At Auntie Liu's workshop, it takes less than a minute for her to wrap up a dumpling. Every year during the Dragon Boat Festival, her family's zongzi orders soared, a daily average of more than 400 packages, the number of four times more than the usual increase, relying on Aunt Liu and her husband's bare hands to complete. Compared with the factory assembly line production of steamed rice dumplings, this hidden in the city residents in the alley of the rice dumplings handmade workshop seems less conspicuous. But the dumplings are not afraid of the deep alley, Liu said that relative to the factory mass production of steamed dumplings, many local restaurants and workshops are more favorable to the family workshop handmade dumplings.
This is the neighborhood's fascination with traditional food culture and taste habits, as well as an unforgettable taste and emotional memory. Aunt Liu and her husband said they are not looking for a big business, but only to wrap each dumpling, to ensure the quality of the product, and to live within their means to earn enough to live on.
The dumplings are very large, pyramid-shaped, 3-5 times the size of ordinary dumplings, each weighing about 0.5 kilograms. One cooked dumpling is enough for 2-3 people. And more interesting is that the heritage and production of Zhaoqing steamed rice dumplings and traditional rice dumplings have many different, so Zhaoqing in the past in the steamed culture to apply for intangible cultural heritage, the local experts put forward the "steamed rice dumplings are not rice dumplings," the point of view. Obviously look like a dumpling, but the local people say "wrapped steam is not dumplings"! In this regard, welcome to understand the culture of wrapping steamed rice dumplings friends leave a message with everyone "science".