When you go to Nanchang, you have to try the local distinctive meat cake soup. Basically, friends who live in Nanchang have tasted this soup. The taste is indeed very good. Here are some tips: Let me introduce this soup to you. "Meatloaf" has different definitions in the north and the south

Before talking about "meatloaf soup", we must first talk about "meatloaf".

The word "meat pie" has a huge difference in the context of northern and southern China. In the northern language system, when it comes to "cake", there must be dough involved, such as pancakes, pies, sugar cakes, etc., and "meat pie" refers to wrapping meat fillings with dough and frying them in a pot. A staple dish that resembles a pie later. Unlike pies, meat pies are much larger in size and are usually made with pork or beef and green onions, with no additional vegetables. The baked meatloaf is cut into 6-8 pieces diagonally. Beijingers call such a piece "Yiyan'er". The skin is thin and the meat is thick. When you bite into it, you will be immediately conquered by the satisfaction brought by the meat and fat. This is what a perfect meatloaf should look like.

In my childhood memories, especially in the summer when I didn’t like cooking, my family would buy a few Jingdong meatloaf and cook a pot of millet porridge, which was a good meal.

So when I heard "meat pie soup", my most instinctive reaction was to associate it with meat pie - soup made from processed meat patties - what the hell is that?!

I later learned that "meat pie" in the context of the South specifically refers to a pie-shaped object made of meat fillings, and it is usually chopped or beaten to produce glue and stick together. , except for pure meat and a little grated ginger, basically no additional ingredients are used. Put the chopped meatloaf in a crock pot or stew pot, or simmer or steam it to make meatloaf soup. Chopped meatloaf has its own gelatin, which makes it easier to precipitate amino acids than unchopped meat. This may be one of the reasons why meatloaf soup is more attractive than directly stewing a few pieces of ribs.

At first, after I figured out what meatloaf soup was, I wasn’t that interested in it. In my opinion, the "Winter Melon and Boiled Meatball Soup" that people in Beijing make at home is much more exciting than the meatloaf soup: the meat filling is stirred and stirred, then the meatballs are made into meatballs with a tiger's mouth, and the meatballs are cooked in boiling water. ", and also put winter melon and vermicelli on it, and sprinkle with pepper. It is simply a home-cooked delicacy that is popular on the tables of Beijingers but not popular among outsiders. Isn't this richness more tempting than meatloaf soup with only meat?

It wasn’t until I went to Nanchang last month that I saw the number of soup shops in the streets. I was addicted to the piping hot meat cake soup at a temperature of nearly 40 degrees. I even once doubted that the people in the universe who are the best at making soup should not be from Jiangxi. What types of meatloaf soup are there

Only when I arrived in Nanchang did I have to admit that the status of meatloaf soup in the hearts of Nanchang people is much higher than the status of winter melon meatballs in the hearts of Beijingers, just in terms of types. It's not of the same magnitude.

"Meatloaf soup" is just the basic version, or the general term for this type of simmering soup. In addition to pure meat meat cake soup, meat cakes can be paired with many ingredients, such as eggs, longans, shiitake mushrooms, cuttlefish, snow pears, and tea tree mushrooms. These are just common combinations in stores. I am afraid ordinary people have their own recipes at home.

Egg and meatloaf soup should be the most common, almost every soup shop has it. For a late-night snack at "Mao Zai" in Jingdezhen, what I drank was meat cake and egg drop soup, but it was more interesting to go to the Laosan Yuan Noodle Shop in Nanchang, where eggs and meat cakes are combined. After the meatloaf is ready, crack the whole eggs on top. After it is done, there will be meatloaf on one side and eggs on the other.

The preserved egg meat cake soup is also quite unique. I thought it was just a piece of preserved egg, but I didn’t expect to use a whole one. The preserved eggs that have been heated to a higher temperature are very soft and half-melted, which sounds a bit dark. However, some Jiangxi people love this bite so much that they even ask the store to cook the preserved eggs until they are almost melted.

My favorite is the cuttlefish cake soup. It only requires a small dried cuttlefish, and the simmered soup has an extra layer of complex umami flavor. The meatloaf itself has a soft texture, and the dried cuttlefish mixed in it gives you something to chew besides the big meatloaf. Even though I was sweating profusely from drinking, I still had more to say. Earthen Pot Soup

A more authentic way to make meatloaf soup is to use Jiangxi’s unique earthen pot to simmer it. Walking on the streets of Nanchang, you can often see the four characters "Crock Pot Simmering Soup" appearing on the archways of small shops. Come closer, no matter how small or shabby the store is, there is a huge clay pot standing at the door. , there is a carved dragon on it, which gives it the impression of a shop.

Food glutton Xiao Kuanpang once said that every city has its own local delicacy, which is so secretive that it is difficult to see it even in surrounding places. In Beijing, it’s fried liver, and in Shanghai, it’s Caotou circle. They are all local snacks that only local people know; even this principle has a certain degree of persuasion abroad. Florence's specialty snack, tripe buns, cannot be found in other cities in Italy, even in places like Bologna, known as the "City of Fat People."

I don’t know if there is no crock pot soup outside Jiangxi, but what is certain is that even if this kind of food that is picky about utensils spreads to other provinces, its original flavor will probably be lost. Quite a few.

Even in Jiangxi, if there is a crock pot soup shop in towns other than Nanchang, the place of origin "Nanchang Shengjin Pagoda" must be marked on the signboard as a keyword to show authenticity.

The principle of earthenware pot soup is simply to use "a large earthen pot to simmer a small earthen pot". Each large earthen pot is specially made of clay. China has had the habit of using clay pots to hold liquids or food since ancient times, and even in some European and American countries, there is a custom of using clay pots to brew wine. This is because the clay pot has both good air permeability and heat preservation properties. The liquid inside does not affect breathing and can be heated evenly.

The bottom of the large earthen jar can be used to light a fire. There is a fixed iron rack inside the jar. The chef will stack the small earthen jars containing ingredients on the iron rack one by one, and some will also put them on the iron rack. The seal of the pot is covered with a layer of tin foil for better sealing and heat preservation; when simmering, the charcoal is first lit, and the high temperature generated by the charcoal fire is used to transfer the heat from the large earthen pot to the small earthen pot, thereby simmering the soup. There was no open flame in the small earthen pot throughout the process, and it was in a state of simmering for a long time without boiling. The advantage of doing this is that it does not harm the nutritional content of the ingredients. It is similar to the way Cantonese people, who are also good at making soup, use a stew pot to stew soup across water.

Simmering soup usually takes 6-8 hours. After the charcoal fire is extinguished, the good heat preservation performance of the earthen pot can keep the soup at a higher temperature. The soup simmered in the morning will not last long even if you go to the store to drink it in the afternoon. Still very hot. Some customers who are in a hurry or impatient will ask the store to pour the soup into a small bowl, which saves time when it cools. But I, a foreigner, have a special liking for small earthen pots. Even if I grinned from the hot soup, I still couldn't bear to pour it into a bowl.

In my opinion, although fried noodles with soup is a very simple meal, as soon as this small, palm-sized crock pot is served, it will immediately give people a sense of ritual to eat well. .

Yuan Mei, a gourmet in the Qing Dynasty, once lamented: Food is not as good as beautiful utensils, as the saying goes. Different dishes should be served in corresponding containers, and you can taste them by mixing them. I stared at this small earthen jar, thinking about those "imitation Tang banquets" and "imitation Song Dynasty banquets". I should start with the food utensils.

In a small fried rice noodle shop in Nanchang, I had a casual chat with the owner.

"Every morning, I have to get up at 2 or 3 o'clock to make soup, and at 6 o'clock, the first batch of customers come for breakfast."

If you ask a random Nanchang person, What is the most popular local breakfast? The answer is probably "mixed noodles with meatloaf soup." This classic combination is probably the taste gene that every Nanchang person traveling in a foreign land cannot forget. My friends in Nanchang have told me more than once that when I am sick or feeling unwell in Beijing, what I miss most is the meat pie soup in my hometown. Every time I go home, I have to grab my luggage and rush to a breakfast shop in the early morning after leaving the train station. Mix a bowl of powder with a crock pot of soup. When the soup is completely pure and pink, you will feel comfortable all over your body.

In the scorching heat of July, I sipped the soup and wiped my sweat, and I felt very refreshed. I immediately thought to myself that a cup of egg and meat cake soup only costs 4.5 yuan. You can also buy clay pots, it shouldn’t be very expensive, right? Where to eat

1. Laowu Food Stall | Kidney Soup, Fried Noodles

Before I went to Nanchang, my friend went with I said, take me to a particularly delicious kidney soup shop. Since I don’t usually eat kidneys, I didn’t have high expectations. But this kidney soup is really good. It is packed in a small container similar to a steam pot. The ingredients are fresh and there is no peculiar smell. If you go to Nanchang again, you must visit again. You can try both their stir-fried noodles and mixed noodles. What I regret about my trip to Nanchang this time is that I didn’t get any particularly amazing stir-fried noodles.

Kidney soup 15 yuan

Address: The intersection of Supu Road and Minde Road.

2. Long Laowu Soup Shop | Crock Pot Soup of Various Flavors

It is said that Long Laowu and the Yuzhang Dalaowu opposite have been arguing about who is the Nanchang Crock Pot The birthplace of soup, because the two stores used to be in front of Shengjin Pagoda, legend has it that the clay pot soup originated from here.

Afterwards, due to rectification and demolition, both families moved to a place not far from Shengjin Pagoda and started to become a "scenic restaurant". There were many tourists in the store and it was noisy. But even so, Long Laowu's houseware crock pot soup is still outstanding. In addition to meat cake soup, there are also various health soups.

A friendly reminder, don’t order their fried noodles and mixed noodles, especially the fried noodles, which have a mushy taste. But the crock pot soup is really good (I don’t understand how a store can be so divided

Preserved egg meat cake soup 6 yuan

Squid meat cake soup 5 yuan

Address: No. 203, Zhanqian West Road (next to Wangzhongwang Supermarket)

3. Laosanyuan Noodle Shop | Mixed Noodles

A noodle shop has been opened in Nanchang for decades. As everyone knows, there are now three branches.

The specialty of the store is the mixed noodles, which are really delicious, especially the dried radish. It is finished after a few slurps, and it is still unfinished! It should be considered a must. The best noodles I have eaten in Nanchang.

They also have meatloaf soup. I originally wanted pear meatloaf soup, but the store said there were only 8 servings per day and it was sold out very early. If you want to drink it, you have to go early. The last thing I drank was the egg and meat patty soup. The meat patty was very tender.

Small bowl of rice noodles 3.5 yuan

Large bowl of rice noodles 4.5 yuan

Snow pear meatloaf soup 5 yuan

Multiple addresses, Reference: Baojia Lane Community, Baihuazhou Street (Jiandeguan Store)

4. Hu Ji Lao Nanchang Beer Duck Mixed Noodles | Mixed Noodles, Pork Liver Soup

It tastes very good chain stores. It specializes in beer-based duck noodles, but before I went there, I read reviews that said the braised pork sausage was pretty good. After debating for a long time, I decided to order the braised pork sausage. It was indeed very fragrant, and even now I still salivate when I mention it. Personally, I feel that the toppings of this noodle restaurant should be good. Next time I go there, I want to try the beer duck noodle.

There is no meatloaf soup here, but the pork liver and egg drop soup is also good, and it goes well with the slightly spicy mixed noodles. And there are so many pork livers! It only costs 5 yuan, and the prices in Nanchang are always impressive.

Braised pork intestine rice noodles 12 yuan

Beer duck rice noodles 13 yuan

Pork liver and egg soup 5 yuan

Multiple addresses, Reference: 10 meters west of the intersection of Fuzhou Road and Fuzhou Branch Road

5. Xiaocheng Shaobing Shop|Various Shaobings

Finally, there is a Shaobing shop included. A chance encounter on the road, later Only then did I find out that it was an Internet-famous shaobing shop that had been open in Nanchang for more than ten years. It was a small shop, but there were usually a lot of people and long queues.

I bought one sweet and one salty fresh meat and white sugar sesame cakes, a little bit of meat but very fresh and fragrant! It was my first time to eat these thin and crispy sesame cakes from the South, and I regretted not buying two more. The ones with dried prunes and pickled mustard and fresh meat should also be delicious.

There is a limit of 20 pieces per person, but it is said that Rene Liu went to Nanchang and bought 100 pieces, probably as a celebrity benefit~

Various sesame seed cakes 1.5 yuan/piece

Address: No. 117, Xiangshan North Road ( Opposite City No. 1 Hospital, Xiaogongmiao Lane)