Shuipen mutton is a famous traditional snack of Han nationality in Shaanxi, and it is a dish with mutton brisket as the main ingredient. The Shuipen mutton in Dali, Pucheng and Chengcheng counties of Weinan City, Shaanxi Province is the most famous, especially in Dali. Shuipen mutton is an excellent warming tonic. This issue introduces Shaanxi culture to you.

Dali Shuipen mutton is the most famous. Shuipen mutton evolved from the "sheep's nest" in Shang and Zhou Dynasties. It was called "mutton hut" in Qin and Han dynasties, and "mountain boiled sheep" in Tang and Song dynasties. In the book "Shan Jia Qing Gong", the skill of cooking mutton soup is described, and it is pointed out: "There is a secret method for sheep to make a pot and put it in a casserole, except for green peppers. Only a few pieces of real almonds are used, and the bones are also eroded."

There is a story in The Book of Song Dynasty to the effect that during the Northern and Southern Dynasties, wars continued, and the people suffered. A man named Mao Xiuzhi was captured. Because of his cooking skills, he offered mutton soup to Song Wudi, which was delicious. He changed from a captive to an official order, and later he was promoted to Nanjun Gong. After the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the Five Dynasties, the Song and Yuan Dynasties, people of all ethnic groups moved and exchanged, and more people entered the mainland to live, and the original folk customs "gradually changed into old customs".

Dou Taihou, the mother of Li Shimin, Emperor Taizong, was from Xianbei, and so was Changsun Shi, his queen. Intermarriage among ethnic groups will inevitably affect food customs. Guanzhong is located in the hinterland of the Central Plains, close to pastoral areas, and is an ideal market for cattle and sheep trading in history. Historical street names in Xi 'an, such as Dongyang City, Xiyang City, Niushi Lane and Luoma City, all prove the formation and development of basin mutton.

mutton is a warm tonic food in autumn and winter, but Shaanxi chefs, who are good at cooking beef and mutton, create basin mutton to meet people's summer needs. Because it is mostly available in June of the lunar calendar, people call it "fresh in June" and praise it. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, when Li Zicheng, the king of Chuang, led the peasant uprising army and was ready to leave Shaanxi to attack Beijing, the people in Guanzhong used basin mutton to comfort the rebel army, and the soldiers of the rebel army were encouraged to attack Beijing at one go and overthrow the decadent rule of the Ming Dynasty. When eating mutton in water basin, the most authentic way is to match it with two crescent-shaped sesame cakes with Dali characteristics, one with meat, the other with steamed buns, and fresh garlic or sugar garlic, and the seasoning oil and spicy seeds need to be splashed with sheep oil, so the meat is rotten and clear, fat but not greasy, mellow and delicious, and has a unique flavor.

When people in Shaanxi eat mutton in a basin, they often eat it with sesame cakes, accompanied by fresh garlic, hot sauce or sugar garlic. They can soak steamed buns in a bowl of soup, even eat and drink it, or take a sip of steamed buns and drink soup. The most authentic mutton in a basin in Dali County, Shaanxi Province is eaten with a crescent-shaped sesame cake. A bowl of mutton is matched with two sesame cakes, and the fat and thin mutton slices are sandwiched in a crescent-shaped sesame cake that has just been punched out. Shuipen mutton is called mutton paomo in Dali, Pucheng and Chengxian, which is equivalent to the hometown of the state capital, and mutton paomo in Xi 'an is called boiled bun. Dali's "water basin mutton" is characterized by "fragrant soup, crisp meat and brown cake". Cooking cakes with food are basically round and crescent-shaped, all of which are made of winter wheat flour from Weibei. Because of the long growth period, they are white and strong, and the baked cakes are crispy and delicious.

nutrition and nourishment are essential for cold protection in winter. Mutton is sweet and warm, and enters the spleen, stomach, kidney and heart meridian; Warming and nourishing the spleen and stomach is used to treat nausea, emaciation and chills caused by deficiency and cold of the spleen and stomach; Warming and nourishing liver and kidney, used to treat soreness, weakness, cold pain and impotence of waist and knees caused by kidney-yang deficiency; Tonifying blood and warming channels are used for abdominal cold pain caused by postpartum blood deficiency and cold channels. The ancient medicine in China believed that mutton was a good product for nourishing Yuanyang, nourishing essence and blood, treating lung deficiency, benefiting strain and warming the middle stomach, and it was an excellent warming and strengthening agent.