Introduction: Palace cuisine is a classic and master of ancient Chinese cooking skills, and has become an outstanding representative of Chinese cuisine. As a chef, if he can cook court dishes well, then his cooking must be superb. As for court food, what is it? Let's take a look at some introductions about court food I have prepared for you!
concept
China court dishes are mainly represented by several ancient capitals, which are divided into southern flavor and northern flavor.
Nanxu is represented by Jinling, Yidu, Nanlin and Du Ying.
Wei Bei is represented by Chang 'an, Luoyang, Kaifeng, Beijing and Shenyang.
Their common characteristics are luxury and rarity, and standard dishes have certain specifications. This tradition has been preserved since the Shang and Zhou Dynasties. Like the Book of Rites? In the internal rules? Bazhen? (There are many different sayings that dragon liver, phoenix marrow, leopard fetus, carp tail, roasted, red lips, bear's paw and crispy cicada wing are the eight treasures of later generations), which have been used for more than two thousand years. However, the specific content is constantly developing and changing. What are the eight treasures of land and water in Tang Dynasty? The red hump was brought back from the emerald broiler (the disc with crystal scales)? In a word, there are not only land products but also aquatic products. In the future, the northern babao and the kitchen babao will be dominated by game. In the Qing Dynasty, it developed further, jumped out of the palace and appeared in shops, with names such as Shan Babao, Hai Babao, Shang Babao and Xia Babao. Since the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, palace cuisine mainly refers to Beijing palace cuisine, which is characterized by strict selection of materials, fine production, beautiful shapes and colors, and clear, fresh, crisp and tender taste. Famous dishes include fried chicken breast, pork tenderloin, four kinds of gravy, four kinds of sauces, four kinds of crispy skin, small sugar corn, pea yellow, kidney bean yellow and so on. Now Beijing's imitation food still manages this traditional court-style dish. Xi 'an also successfully copied the court dishes of the Tang Dynasty and supplied them to the outside world. There are mainly three kinds of banquets, including the Eight Scenes of Chang 'an, the Dragon and Phoenix Banquet and the Shao Wei Banquet, with more than 50 varieties.
Classification of court dishes
Influenced by the location of the capital, the flavors of court dishes in past dynasties are divided into two styles: southern flavor and northern flavor. However, although the tastes of court dishes in the past dynasties were divided into north and south tastes, they all shared a common feature, namely luxury and rarity, as well as the standard specifications of side dishes. Nowadays, what people call court cuisine generally refers to the court-style dishes in the Qing Dynasty. The court dishes in Qing Dynasty were mainly developed on the basis of Shandong flavor, Manchu flavor and Suzhou-Hangzhou flavor.
Gongtingcai raw materials
Palace cuisine has unique advantages over other cuisines in the selection of raw materials. It can choose folk top-grade cooking materials at will, pay tribute to famous local products all over the world, and widely collect and obtain rare treasures in all things in the world. But there are strict requirements on the origin, texture, size and location of these raw materials. Sometimes, in order to adjust the taste, some common raw materials are also selected, but the delicious cooking and expensive accessories are not comparable to folk dishes.
Palace cuisine also attaches great importance to the plastic arts of dishes, requiring patterns to be as beautiful and pleasing as bonsai.
The main methods used in modeling are "surrounding, matching, embedding and brewing". "Surrounding" means that vegetarian dishes are surrounded by meat and small materials are surrounded by meat. Pay attention to the different characteristics of vegetarian dishes in terms of color, texture, taste and nutritional components, so as to adjust the color and fragrance of dishes, set off the main ingredients and highlight the main flavor, so that the two can complement each other in taste and nutrition. "Matching" refers to matching two raw materials with different shapes, thus giving them a specific meaning, such as "Xuemei Huangkui" made by matching shrimp balls with meat stuffing and egg dumplings. "Embedding" refers to embellishing a raw material with another specially processed raw material to make the dishes more vivid. For example, "Goldfish Playing Lotus" is made of green peppers, peas and shrimp tails. They are embedded and decorated on fish-shaped embryos made of whole shrimp and ground mud. "Brewing" is to fill all kinds of finely processed raw materials, such as minced meat, silk and grain, into plastic raw materials, so that the appearance of dishes is more complete and full, and the taste is more mellow and delicious. In the cooking process of the same dish, various methods such as surrounding, collocation, setting and brewing are often used, so they are often inclusive and have both.
Palace dishes should avoid the simplification of raw materials, and generally require the combination of two or more dishes. There are also special requirements for the size and specifications of raw materials. It's neither too big nor too small, neither too much nor too little, and the entrance is just right. This is the principle of cutting and matching raw materials for court cuisine. When serving, we should strive to have a full, flat, loose and round style. In the processing and collocation of raw materials, court cuisine has strict and subtle requirements for knife workers. In addition to modeling factors according to the characteristics of raw materials, we should also pay attention to making raw materials easy to taste when cooking. Exquisite and rich knife skills, strict processing requirements. The taste of court food is said to be "998 1 mouth", and each taste is named after a wonderful vocabulary. Palace cuisine not only pays great attention to the shape of dishes, but also uses luxurious and quaint tableware. There are gold, silver, jade, crystal, agate, coral, rhinoceros horn, tortoise shell, ivory and so on. And a large number of exquisite porcelain specially made by the official kiln. In addition, court food also pays attention to seasonality, with more cakes, pasta, dried and fresh fruits and more barbecues.
The legendary history of court cuisine
Although there were many palaces in many dynasties in the history of China, the palace dishes we are talking about now refer to the dishes in the imperial kitchens of the Qing Dynasty. According to Master Er Honglin, the ninth generation descendant of Nala family, the Manchu royal chef in Qing Dynasty, it also absorbed many dishes of court cuisine in Ming Dynasty, especially Emperor Kangxi and Emperor Qianlong visited Jiangnan many times and appreciated southern cuisine very much. Therefore, the dishes in the imperial chef of the Qing Palace absorbed many flavor dishes from all over the country as well as Mongolian, Hui and Manchu flavor meals. Palace cuisine, known as the best in the world, is a vivid history. It embodies the historical characteristics of Beijing's 800-year-old ancient capital and is full of aristocratic blood. The process of tasting court food is not only a process of enjoying food, but also a process of experiencing the noblest and rarest dishes in the world.
The secret achievement of court cuisine
Can the characteristics of court food be used? Rare, rare, quaint, weird? In a word, it is particularly exquisite in color, quality, taste, shape and utensils, with royal and elegant temperament and rich artistic beauty. Judging from the experience of eating guests and the introduction of Master Er Honglin, what is the biggest feature of Gongting cuisine? Thick soup tastes strong? No loss? Soft and elegant? . To achieve this, many secrets are needed from material selection to operation. For example, many court dishes need to be hung with soup, and the process of hanging soup is extremely complicated: the old hen raised in Tianjin Baodi is usually paired with other old ducks, chickens, chicken feet and various seafood, and then stewed at different times according to the requirements of different dishes, and different spices are added at different times. Only in this way can the soup out of the pot be thick enough and mellow enough. Therefore, it is by no means a signboard. Even if it is a palace dish, the real palace dish can only be restored to its true appearance by passing down from generation to generation through ancestral cheats.
Royal Buddha jumping wall
Ingredients: abalone, shark's fin, sea cucumber, fish belly, fish lips, deer penis, deer tendon, crab roe, lake shrimp, scallop, etc. 18 kinds of raw materials and secret history soup: After the famous Fujian dish "Fotiaoqiang" was introduced into the Qing Palace, it failed to win the favor of the royal family because of its outstanding southern cuisine and large proportion of seafood. Therefore, the head chef asked Manchu chefs to improve their eating habits, and added venison, birds and other game that Manchu royal family liked to eat on the basis of retaining the production process. After many times of debugging and improvement, it achieved the emperor Buddha jumping wall, which was favored by the royal family at that time.
Braised shark's fin with yellow wine
Ingredients: Luzon Island yellow wings, chicken soup, etc. Secret History of the Palace: At the end of the Qing Dynasty (the 13th year of Tongzhi), Tan Zongjun and his son, officials of the Imperial Academy, created the famous official dish Tan Jiacai because they were very particular about diet. What is the most famous dish? Braised shark fin? . At that time, whoever cooked delicious food would go to the Forbidden City to invite Long Yan. Braised shark fin? This is how it was absorbed into the court dishes of the Qing Dynasty. Tan Fu sent this dish to the royal chef in the form of a box, and the emperor praised it after tasting it, so this dish was included in the royal menu by the royal chef and has been circulated for more than 100 years.
Qin Yong palace roasted deer tendon
Ingredients: sika deer tendon, Chinese cabbage, medlar, pheasant and old hen thick soup. Secret History of the Palace: When Yong Zhengdi was a prince in the Qing Dynasty, he would take his troops to Changbai Mountain or Mulan paddock to hunt every year, and he would harvest a lot of prey every time. As a famous warrior emperor Yongzheng in history, his favorite food is deer tendon. He believes that men need to constantly strengthen their bones and muscles and replenish their physical strength. So Qin Bing stewed pheasants and deer tendons together, served them with cabbage and wild medlar on the mountain, and drank them heartily together. After Yongzheng ascended the throne, the chef in the imperial kitchen treated this dish more carefully and put it on the menu.
Qing gong wan fu rou
Ingredients: Selected pork belly, Huairou chestnut, Shandong Jinsixiaozao, and the secret history of the West Lake Lotus uterus: At the birthday banquet of Empress Dowager Cixi's 60th birthday, the chefs in the imperial dining room showed their talents and presented birthday gifts in succession. This dish was created by Zhao, a Shandong native, based on the traditional auspicious characters in China. After steaming, boiling, frying and buckling, all the fat in the pork belly is extracted, making the pork belly fat but not greasy, and it will not make people fat even if they eat it frequently. Because the name of this dish means premature birth, it was deeply liked by Empress Dowager Cixi and her concubines and was nominated impromptu? Wanfu meat? .
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