No. 1 one
Liuzhou and its surrounding areas may be one of the most livable areas in southwest China. Geographically, there is an exclusive term "Guiliu Valley". Gui is Guilin; Willow is Liuzhou; The valley is a valley with flat terrain and fertile water plants, which is washed by dense river networks such as Lijiang River and Liujiang River.
As a typical subtropical monsoon region, Liuzhou is in summer for most of the year, and the hot air from Southeast Asia will go north with moist water vapor and head-on hit 100,000 mountains in Guangxi, forming continuous rain. The inland climate with the largest precipitation in East Asia is thus formed.
At the same time, the water-holding capacity of karst caves on the ground in Guiliu Valley is very poor, and the precipitation eventually becomes a river network on the ground, flowing out continuously. The rivers carved Guilin landscape with the best scenery in the world, and also provided shelter for a large number of small aquatic animals.
Such as snails. In the 1970s and 1980s, archaeologists discovered the accumulated remains of snail shells that lasted for 20,000 years in two prehistoric human sites, namely, Zhupi Rock in Guilin and Bailiandong in Liuzhou.
The most interesting thing is that the tails of these shells are all punched with stones. Obviously, they are not accumulated by natural death, but are treated and even cooked consciously by human beings for the convenience of sucking snail meat-snails are still treated in this way in many areas today.
Yes, as the most accessible local source of protein, there was a custom of eating snails in Liuzhou before the written history. The long time span has brought space for the improvement of technology. Stir-fried snails, spicy boiled snails, clear soup snails, snail pot, and stuffed snails ... Liuzhou's local snails are rich in eating methods, which are rare elsewhere.
No.2 er
In addition to snails, abundant precipitation and warm climate have also brought another specialty-sour bamboo shoots to Liuzhou area.
In fact, bamboo shoots have fast growth cycle, short edible time limit and high preservation difficulty. Mild fermentation of bamboo shoots to form yeast colony advantage, in order to prolong the preservation period and obtain more amino acids with umami flavor, is a food custom in many places. Gu Xiu, a Ming Dynasty man, recorded in The Remains of Haicha that people on Hainan Island boiled the bitter water in bamboo shoots, soaked them in a well for two or three days, and split them into thin acid bamboo shoots. A Dream of Red Mansions in the Qing Dynasty recorded the story of Jia Baoyu, a native of Jiangnan, who used sour bamboo shoots and chicken skin soup to relieve alcohol. As a geographical label, sour bamboo shoots can be fixed in Guangxi and Liuzhou, which is not unrelated to the local climate and geography. The long and humid summer has brought abundant bamboo shoots to the local area, which are not only abundant, but also grow as thick as arms. If you can't finish a meal, you should naturally find ways to overcome the perishable characteristics of bamboo shoots and preserve them properly without wasting. In winter, the local climate will undergo a 180 degree reversal. The dry and cold climate, coupled with the poor water retention of karst landforms, means that it is impossible to produce bamboo shoots for several months in a year. At this time, making preserved sour bamboo shoots in summer has become a boon to satisfy people's thoughts on the dining table.
There are two kinds of sour bamboo shoots in Guangxi, which are soaked in clear spring water and soaked in rice washing water. The latter's bamboo shoots can be fermented with starch in water, which will have a strong odor and rich taste. It is often used to make dishes that need to be tasted, such as fried beef with bamboo shoots and braised diced fish with sour bamboo shoots and soybeans. The sour bamboo shoots soaked in clear spring water are more light and sharp in acidity, and are more common as refreshing side dishes in snacks such as Liuzhou snail powder, Nanning old friends noodles, Guilin rice noodles and Dong-style hot and sour soup. Therefore, snail powder is smelly, but it is not more exaggerated than other rice noodles and hot and sour soup in Guangxi. If the smell is too loud, maybe this bowl of snail powder is not authentic.
No.3 San
Naturally giving Liuzhou a taste, of course, is not the whole story of snail powder. What really put this city on the historical stage is a canal called Lingqu.
This canal, built by Qin Shihuang, is not remarkable in the history of China's capital construction, regardless of its construction age, technology and length, but it has historically opened the Xiangjiang River and Lijiang River, connecting the Yangtze River system and the Pearl River system here.
From then on, Nanling was no longer an insurmountable natural barrier, and the magnificent army of the Qin Empire was able to go upstream from the waterway and occupy the rich Pearl River Delta plain. In the next thousand years, Nanyue was no longer a place of detention, but since ancient times, it has been connected with the culture of the Central Plains Dynasty and has frequent exchanges of talents.
Liuzhou is an important transit point on this waterway connecting line.
Many people may have noticed that although Hunan and Jiangxi are bordered by Guangdong, their food tastes are quite different. Hunan cuisine heavy oil is spicy, rich and delicious; Gancai is spicy and full of fireworks. They take a completely different path from Cantonese cuisine, which pays attention to the original ingredients. Even though Chenzhou in southern Hunan and Ganzhou in southern Jiangxi are only over 100 kilometers away from Shaoguan in northern Guangdong, there is no trace of mutual influence.
The reason is actually very simple: in ancient times, there was no unimpeded traffic in the fragmented Nanling Mountains. When people enter Guangdong from Hunan and Jiangxi, they must pass through Lingqu, Guilin and Liuzhou in eastern Guangxi.
The real collision between the two kinds of food aesthetics is in Liuzhou. The soup head of snail powder is obviously the product of this collision: on the one hand, it uses pig bones and snail meat to stew a rich soup head, which is a typical Cantonese-style old fire soup; On the other hand, it is seasoned with compound spices such as star anise, cinnamon, clove and pepper, and a tablespoon of vinegar and a tablespoon of Chili oil are poured before serving. The enthusiasm of Hunan-Jiangxi cuisine and the original flavor of Guangdong-Guangzhou cuisine complement each other here.
No.4 si
The excavation of Lingqu, in addition to the fierce collision between the two food cultures, also brought another food cause for Guangxi: rice noodles.
From the perspective of cost performance, the taste of wheat cooked directly is very poor, and only by grinding into noodles can its advantages be fully exerted; However, it is obviously unnecessary to crush rice into strips. The original rice grains can be directly cooked to obtain excellent taste, and it takes a lot of effort to grind and shape them, but it can't improve the taste level.
However, for those northerners who fled the war and relegated to rice-growing areas in ancient times, rice products are a good substitute for pasta. After being demoted to Liuzhou, Liu Zongyuan, a native of Shanxi Province, wrote the sentence "Poor wheat in west Gansu and rice in the south of the Yangtze River, thinking that my brother will live long", which represented his understanding of the staple food culture in the north and south.
The rice noodle culture in Guangxi has become a prominent school of local cuisine under the impetus of Hakka immigrants who loved noodles from generation to generation.
In Guangxi, every place has its own unique rice noodles, which are unexpected and impossible. For example, Guilin rice noodles, Nanning Laoyou powder, Qinzhou pig's foot powder, Rongan Rongshui filter powder, Wuming raw meal powder, Yulin raw meal powder, Binyang acid powder, Luocheng big head powder, Qiaowei duck meat powder, Baise roasted duck powder, Pingguo curly powder, Quanzhou red oil powder, Pumiao raw meal powder, Luoxiu rice powder, Tiandeng chicken powder, etc.
Snail powder is undoubtedly the most famous one among them.
No.5 Wu
Everything is available, except for the east wind. When the four souls of snails, sour bamboo shoots, soup seasoning and rice noodles are all ready, you only need to finish the door and the delicious food that makes people dream can be born.
This one foot, come later than imagination, also more sharp.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, because of convenient traffic conditions and livable natural environment, Guilin and Liuzhou, both core cities of Guiliu Valley, were assigned different development tasks: Guilin focused on tourism and became the representative of China scenery printed on RMB; Liuzhou, on the other hand, vigorously develops the heavy industry that New China needs more. In just a few decades, large industrial enterprises such as Liugong, Liugang and Liuqi came into being.
Industrial cities have changed people's living habits. In order to meet the needs of workers' shift work, Liuzhou's nightlife has been enriched as never before, including late-night movies in cinemas, prosperous small commodity trade in night markets, and midnight snack culture that workers love.
Snail powder is a perfect expression of all kinds of traditional ingredients and cooking techniques in Liuzhou, with midnight snack as the display form. First, boil the snail meat in the sour bamboo shoot bone soup, and add the prepared and easy-to-operate peanuts, fungus, yuba and daylily. Finally, hot powder with fresh soup is served on the table, so that people who come to snack can enjoy a bowl of rice noodles with heavy oil and water and full flavor as soon as possible, supplement their tired bodies after work and comfort their tired hearts at night.
Although the history of snail powder seems to be only a few decades. But one of them, a peck, a soup and a dish, all hide the long-standing amorous feelings of Liuzhou. At the same time, the snail powder was born in the grass roots and walked in the rivers and lakes. From the beginning, it was doomed that it would finally reach the delicious altar. All tastes have a place to come and a way back.