Chapter 27 Hunan Cuisine and Tan Chu

There is an old saying that food is the most important thing for people. In ancient times, people lived in caves in the wild, and if they could drink blood to fill their stomachs, that's fine.When there is the beauty of the palace city, the prosperity of the Fusi, the splendor of the Fufu, and the way of eating and cooking, of course, it will follow the water and land, and it will change with each passing day.Although cooking is a trivial matter, it is closely related to the culture of a country.In terms of culture in the world, China is the oldest country with a long history, extensive and profound, so Chinese food and cooking are also famous all over the world.

According to the legends of the older generation, the recipes of the Qing Dynasty were reproduced along the river, and three types of schools can be distinguished: Lingnan School, the Pearl River Valley, and Guangzhou as the center.Guangzhou was the first to open a port, with numerous auxiliary ships and a collection of wealthy merchants. Of course, they were extremely extravagant for eating, drinking and having fun.Nanpai, the Yangtze River Basin, with Yangzhou as the center.Because the salt office is located in Yangzhou, all kinds of salt merchants who attract chestnuts to the shore also use Yangzhou as their distribution center. Officials, merchants and officials are all rich and rich. Strong fight wins.Northern faction, the Yellow River basin, with Kaifeng as the center.Because Hedu was one of the few vacancies in the Qing Dynasty, and the Hedu yamen was located in Kaifeng, where there were many crowns and covers, and there were many entertainments. Everyone was very careful about food and beverages, which is astonishing.

Hunan cuisine pays attention to large plates, large bowls, long chopsticks and paired tabletops. A table can seat seventeen or eight people. Although due to the local climate, the emphasis is on spicy flavors, but the general dishes are also fat and thick, still in line with the true nature of cooking in the Yangtze River area. .Hunan cuisine should be represented by Changsha cuisine.Famous restaurants include Zuibailou, Qizhenge, Yuloudong, Jianyuan, Xu Changxing, Mahou, Weilu, Quyuan, and Shuaiyu, Liu Hong, Pengchu, and Liuchu are also outstanding. In Changsha, there is another thing that is quite special. There are a few well-known gourmets and recognized gourmet experts. Whenever they have a big drink and feast, the menus, dishes and meals in restaurants are regarded as treasures and copied.At that time, the most famous muke (big timber merchant) in Changsha was Liu Yiping. He was the best at ordering dishes. Never get bored.His menu is generally kept like a treasure by diners, and it is called Liu Dan.

There is also Mr. Xiao Shipeng, who is also a celebrity in Changsha. Three or five people have a drink. He orders a few dishes, which are really fresh and delicious, and the price is cheap, so his dishes are called Xiao Dan.There is a saying among Changsha diners that banquets follow Liu, and small drinks follow Xiao, which proves that Changsha people admire Liu Xiao's menu. The author knows Liu Mengbai, the nephew of Liu Yiping, who works as the manager of the Farmers Bank of China in Changsha. There are five of us friends, and we once made a ten-day drink in the Changsha Plain. I tasted all of them, but I also ate nine out of ten.It's a pity that Xiao Dan and Liu Dan didn't copy it down at that time, otherwise, if they go to the Hunan restaurant here to order food, wouldn't they be able to pretend to be Hunan's big boss?

Speaking of Chef Tan, in fact, it is not entirely a famous chef trained by Mr. Tan Zuan, but the old chef of his old master Tan Wenqin. Harmonious Ding Nai has already bred Hongshen, but it was further studied by Weigong and lost his shirt. It's just a trail.The fourth cook of Tan, named Cao Jinchen, is from Changsha. He was originally the cook of Wu Jinzhuang Gengnian, the chief envoy of Hunan Province.Zhuang Pingsu was very particular about clothing and food, and Cao Si was influenced by Zhuang's teachings, and he cooked new dishes every day.After Zhuang Xin'an's death, Cao Si came to Tan's mansion as the chef.

Tan Wenqin has been in Guangdong for many years, and his taste is more or less influenced by Cantonese cuisine, so Chef Cao’s dishes are the basis of Huaiyang cuisine, and the techniques of Lingnan cuisine. If he cooks Hunan cuisine, it is better to say that he is the elite of Chinese cuisine. Rather than being confined to which province or place, it is appropriate. Lv Yunsheng Shizhang (Ruishou) was a protégé of his great-uncle Wen Zhengong. When Lv was working in the Zhejiang Civil Affairs Department, he came to Shanghai to discuss business affairs. It happened that Jiangxi Li Muzhai also came to Shanghai.Knowing each other's colleagues well, on the one hand, Mr. Yunsheng invites everyone to get together, and at the same time, he also wants to show off his cook.

Lu's chef, Cao Huachen Xingjiu, everyone said that Cao Jiu was Cao Si's brother. Although he was not as famous as Cao Si, he was still a well-known chef.Li Mulao is also famous for his proficiency in drinking and food. Cao Jiu knew that the guests at this table were all well-known diners, so he couldn't be careless.Cao Si was in Hangzhou at that time, and Cao Jiu specially asked Si Ge to be the chef from Hangzhou in order to strive for excellence. Mr. Tan Zuan is an expert in shark fin eating. Of course, Chef Tan is best at making shark fins. Let’s talk about shark fins first. Although they are all fins, they are very particular.Guangzhou is the most particular place in the country to eat shark fins. According to Zhang Zemin, the owner of Guansheng Garden, shark fins are classified according to the size and parts of the fish. They can be roughly divided into tail fins, wing fins (also known as skirt fins, buttocks), and shark fins. There are several kinds of water fins (also called hook fins), ridge fins, and purse fins.In the thoracic spine of big fish, the fin filaments are particularly long, so it is also called row fin.

Most people only know that the short and sparse ones are called scattered wings, and the thick and thick ones are called purse wings.Zhang is a well-known chef and diner, so he can make such a comprehensive analysis.The conversation is getting further and further away, let's get back to talking about Tan Chu's shark fin. Chef Tan’s braised bamboo fins, also known as row’s fins, is his main dish. Some people say that he fears the honor and wealth of his life, and he will never afford top-quality shark’s fins. I know the real red braised shark's fin, although it is indispensable to add flavors such as ham, chicken nuggets and abalone.But the whole plate of shark's fin is a treasure if it is full of shark's fins without any other ingredients to enhance the taste.So the ham, chicken and abalone are the same as the shark's fin. They are sandwiched with bamboo strips and burned.Some people say that there are ham and chicken nuggets in the Tan family's meals, so it must be fear of the public and feasting guests.

Mr. Tan Wenqin traveled to southern Guangdong for many years. Chef Cao’s shark fin method is based on Lingnan stewing and Huaiyang stewing.Therefore, Chef Tan’s braised skirt fins, except for late autumn dinner guests who use shark fins with crabmeat instead, when the shark fins are served on the table, there are long needles and thick lips, and a plate full of shark fins, without any other vegetables.When the shark's fin enters the mouth, it is really rich in flavor and juice, which can be called sweet and plump, rich and dripping, and the lips and tongue are cemented.The guests on the seat all praised each other and praised it as a divine product.

Everyone knows that Tan Weigong is an expert in shark fin eating, and Cao Yuchen of the Tan family is a great expert in shark fin cooking. Unexpectedly, when Cao Chef was in Guangdong, he had a candied carp that was even more unique.At the beginning, because the Guangdong-Han Railway was not yet open to traffic, there was a shortage of seafood, fish and shrimp in Hunan, and heroes were useless.When Cao Si came to the land of fish and rice in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, there were mostly fish, clams, shrimps and crabs, so he used Tan Kitchen to entertain guests with another famous dish, which was carp with sugar heart.It is said that carp must be grown with soil, and the head and tail are removed and stewed in a slow fire.

Because the fish meat has not been scratched with a knife or iron, and the firework is done at home. When eating, the fish meat is rich and tender. If you don’t say it is carp, anyone who has never eaten this dish will believe that it is as smooth as sheep fat and egg white. It's fish.It's not surprising to simmer shark's fin to rotten, but there is probably no other person who can simmer carp meat into candied heart except Chef Tan Cao Si. In the more than ten years of the Republic of China, the Small Four Banks (Continental Salt Industry Jincheng Zhongnan is called the Small Four Banks, and the Central Bank of China is called the Big Four Banks) held a meeting in Shanghai. Tan Danya of the Continental Bank, Zhou Zuomin of the Jincheng Bank, and Yue Ganzhai of the Salt Industry Bank all went to Shanghai. Come to the meeting, as a landlord, Hu Bijiang from Central South Bank will naturally entertain him well to show his friendship as a landlord.Tan, Zhou, and Yue are known as the Three Musketeers of Gourmet in the banking industry. Now that they are gathered together, Hu Bijiang can only negotiate with Tan Chef Cao Jinchen to support the scene. For this table, apart from the must-have main dishes of red rotten skirt fin and candied carp, because the guests are all elderly people over fifty years old (in those days, they were considered old people when they turned fifty years old), so Chef Tan specially cooked A dish of stewed deer tendons with clam claws. Clam claws are a kind of clam food. It is similar to the Xishi tongue in Taiwan, but it is more delicious.Deer tendon is very helpful to the health of the elderly, but it is slightly hot.Clam claws are cool, and the two complement each other, and they have become a magic product for warming and tonic.Cao Si's dishes are known for being well-cooked and sticky. Of course, this dish is eaten to the fullest, and everyone is happy. Yue Ganzhai loved tofu most in his life, and he always had tofu for three meals a day, so Wei Gong tofu was originally a home-cooked meal, and he also served a banquet that day.Although Weigong tofu is a meal, the effort put into it is no less than that of braised shark's fin.It is said that the tofu is first boiled in the hanging soybean sprout soup, and then stewed in clear chicken soup after the tofu is full of honeycombs.When eating, the ingredients are put into the pot and burned, so the tofu has absolutely no beany smell.The chicken soup is poured into the hornet's eyes, and the cooking juice cannot seep in. The tofu is plump and soft but not greasy.Although ordinary restaurants also sell Weigong tofu, its taste is different. Bamboo-jointed Chicken Cup is also a famous dish of Chef Tan.The bamboo joints used by Chef Tan are all new bamboos, which are selected for their fragrance. Each joint has only a few pieces of diced chicken and three or five pieces of bamboo fungus. The soup is clear and clear. , It can be regarded as a masterpiece on the table. I heard that Cao didn't accept a penny for the banquet, and he would be very grateful if Mr. Bi Jiang hired his wife, who had just graduated from Fudan University, into Zhongnan Bank.Mr. Bijiang owes Cao Jinchen this great favor, and he is a gentleman who will keep his word and act resolutely. Cao Si's relative naturally got his wish and went to work in Zhongnan Bank. Cao Si's descendants later switched to business.On the contrary, Cao Jiu's son, Cao Jianhe, is also a master of cooking, and has been serving Mr. Song Ziwen as the chef.After Song's death, Cao Jianhe opened a Beijing restaurant in Washington, which is also considered as Tan Chu's overseas direct line.However, there are not many mouths who really know how to eat overseas, and Cao doesn't bother to chop the ingredients and do it himself.But when he meets real diners and friends overseas, Cao Yi is happy, rolls up his sleeves and cooks a dish or two, that would be extraordinary and have a special taste.