Beijing Cheap Square roast duck and braised roast duck are authentic roast ducks, which were introduced to Beijing from Jiangnan in the Ming Dynasty. The earliest cheap store was Mishi Hutong in Caishikou during Yongle period of Ming Dynasty, which was opened by a southerner named Wang. At that time, it was just a small workshop with no font size. They buy live chickens and ducks, slaughter and clean them, send them to other restaurants, restaurants or rich families, do some primary processing services, and also cook braised roast duck, chicken and other foods. Because they clean up the raw chickens and ducks, roast ducks and broilers are crispy and delicious, cheap and very popular with customers. Over time, these restaurants, restaurants and wealthy families called this workshop a cheap square.
Xianyukou Street Cheap Square Roast Duck Restaurant outside Qianmen was founded in the fifth year of Xianfeng in Qing Dynasty (1855), with three shareholders, among which Wang Shaofu, an antique dealer, is the largest shareholder. Xianyukou Street Cheap Shop (called Cheap Shop at that time) was later than the old name of Mishi Hutong, but it came from behind, no matter in the baking technology of roast duck, box vegetables, bucket chicken and soy sauce. In the seventh year of Qing Daoguang (1827), Sun Man, an adult of Shandong Rong, was a disciple for a long time. With the help of Sun Zijiu, the shopkeeper's business is getting better and better. Later, the shopkeeper gave the chicken and duck workshop to his grandson for his son's illness. In the early days of Xianfeng, some people saw that its business was booming and hung up the signboard of Cheap Shop. At that time, there were seven or eight cheap square plaque chicken and duck shops in Beijing. At that time, banquets for the children of the Eight Banners became a common practice, and the front of the store was often filled with big sedan chairs of dignitaries. The Western Empress Dowager also sent someone to send the roast duck from Cheap Square to the palace. According to "Du Men Xiao Ji", "The whole duck (roast duck) will be the main course of the banquet and a famous cheap square."
There was no name of roast duck restaurant in Beijing at the earliest. It's called a box shop, not a chicken and duck shop. The box shop is a round wooden box with a diameter of about one foot two and a thickness of four inches, painted with black or red paint. The box is divided into ten or eleven compartments, and each compartment can hold one kind of food, usually pickles, sausages, donkey meat and other foods. Customers want boxes, mostly from apprentices in box shops. When people use them, they can take back the empty boxes. At that time, Cheap Square operated more than a dozen kinds of raw pork, raw chickens and ducks, oven meat, sausages, meatballs, chicken pieces, duck pieces, cockfighting, sauced meat, braised ducks and so on. Cheap Square's braised roast duck, cockfighting, sauced meat and other commodities have unique flavors and have been deeply loved by people for many years.
After Sun Zijiu took over the workshop, he actively expanded the workshop business. Sun Zijiu's chicken and duck workshop produces raw chicken and duck blanks and cockfighting, which are better than other products and have been sold at low prices. Most big hotels and restaurants in north and south cities are willing to use Sun Zijiu's goods, so the business is very hot. The number of cheap shops has increased from four or five to twelve or thirteen.
The roast duck made by Cheap Square is exquisite in materials, fine in technology, purplish red in color, tender in skin and tender in meat, fat but not greasy. With lotus leaf cake, hollow sesame seed cake, sweet noodle sauce, garlic paste, sugar, cucumber strips, radish strips, etc.
The stewing furnace is a floor furnace, and the furnace body is made of bricks, with a size of about one cubic meter. Before stewing the roast duck, stew the oven temperature with the charcoal fire of sorghum. The stewing furnace uses dark fire, which is of high technical content. The person in charge of the furnace must know the temperature in the furnace. This is not the same as hanging a stove. Hanging the stove is an open fire barbecue, which is easy to master. The duck skin baked in the stewing oven is crispy and tender, fat but not greasy, and has a lot of meat. In order to ensure the quality of roast duck, there is a special person responsible for raising ducks and filling them. Ducks have two sources. One is to buy two or three catties of ducks from the chicken and duck houses in Chaoyangmen and Dongzhimen, and feed them for a short time. When the duck grows to four or five pounds, it will be filled. Another source is that some vendors carrying baskets of chickens and ducks go to suburban villages to buy chickens and ducks, and also send live chickens and ducks to the square.
Cheap shops have been selling seats in their stores since the early Republic of China. They are good at cooking Shandong cuisine, and they are quite accomplished in frying, frying, burning, stewing, boiling and steaming. There are 100 kinds of famous products. Goldfish duck feet, steamed fish fillets, shredded pork vermicelli, clear soup dovetail, grilled shark's fin with three shreds, preserved plum abalone, fried prawns with Chili, fried tenderloin with coke, dried mushrooms with winter bamboo shoots, steamed duck liver with steamed rice, four treasures of salt, onion and sea cucumber, stewed mullet eggs and crispy herring are all representative dishes of this restaurant. In addition, the duck dishes with different tastes and shapes are cooked by making full use of all parts of the duck as raw materials, and on this basis, the whole duck mat is developed, which reflects the unique style and technical level of the cheap roast duck restaurant.
Cockfighting is also a famous food in Cheap Square. Bucket chicken, you must choose the little hen of that year as the bucket of bucket chicken. It is a special pot made of a large deep-bottomed iron pot and a pot without a bottom, which looks like a bucket. After the selected hens are slaughtered, they are taken out of their bellies, put into lotus leaves, put into a barrel pot, and add seasonings such as onion, ginger, garlic, pepper, aniseed and salt into the pot water. First big fire, then small fire, stew. Cut the chicken into shreds, mix with fresh cucumber shreds and eat in your mouth. Light and delicious, it is a delicious winter product.
Sauced meat is also a special food of cheap square. Pickled pork is cut into moderate pieces, washed, marinated with pepper and salt for seven days, then marinated in soy sauce for eight days, that is, "salt seven, sauce eight", and finally cooked with clear water. This kind of sauce meat tastes more fragrant and delicious than ordinary sauce meat. The more you chew, the more fragrant it is, and the stronger the aftertaste is.
From the warlord melee to the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression period, the convenience store in Mishi Hutong declined, while the convenience store in Xianyukou embarked on the road of prosperity. It finally closed down until Beijing was liberated. Only Cheap Square and Quanjude survived the Cultural Revolution and changed their names to Xinlu Restaurant. 1978 changed its name to "Cheap Shop". And opened a new store "Cheap Square" in the east of Chongwenmenwai Street Road.
At the same time, Shandong cuisine is the main dish, and more than 100 special dishes are launched all the year round. . Especially the whole duck pad made of duck tongue, duck paw, duck intestine, duck gizzard, duck liver, duck breast and duck heart is another feature of the cheap square. Such as fried duck four treasures, goldfish duck feet, double-cut duck heart rolls, nut duck liver and so on. They are all representative dishes of Cheap Square.
1974 moved to the current address. Cheap Plaza Roast Duck Restaurant has been renovated several times, which not only combines the traditional national characteristics of China, but also absorbs the rich and luxurious characteristics of the West. Its business area is more than 2,000 square meters, including three large restaurants and more than a dozen private rooms with different styles, which can accommodate thousands of people at the same time. 1996 opened its first branch in Songyu Xili, Panjiayuan, Chaoyang District, with a business area of 400 square meters and can accommodate 200 people.