As the birthplace of Shandong cuisine in China, Boshan has been around for at least two thousand years. It only took two years to become the birthplace of pre-made dishes , Laoyanshen Food Ancient Street located in Boshan.
Two years ago, in order to successfully "resurrect" this thousand-year-old ancient street and revitalize Shandong cuisine, seven old Boshan people, with an average age of 53, pressed their fingerprints together as partners and made an oath.
Looking back at the road I have walked, Fang Lijun, who is the founder of Lao Yanshen Food Ancient Street and a partner, said with deep emotion: "Although doing something cannot rely solely on feelings and enthusiasm, as far as we do, it is really impossible to do without feelings and enthusiasm."
5 Thousand Years Ancient Street marks the "Birthplace of Pre-made Vegetables"
Several autumn rains and autumn winds for several nights, Zibo Lao Yanshen Food Ancient Street in October is still full of vitality. Walking on the streets, tourists are bustling with people, with red leaves all over the mountains, and tea and rice are fragrant, and there is a breath of harvest everywhere.
People who use navigation recently discovered that when searching for "Boshan Laoyanshen Food Ancient Street", there was another location logo on the map - the birthplace of pre-made dishes. Recently, the relevant art works of the Laoyanshen Pre-made dishes team passed the review of the National Copyright Administration and were marked as "the birthplace of pre-made dishes".
The "resurrection" of the ancient street cannot be avoided by the series of numbers "7531". The numbers have no mystery, but just bluntly explains that "the seven old Boshan people did one thing when they were at an average age of 53", which is to jointly revitalize the ancient street in front of them.
In order to "resurrect" this ancient street, I have experienced many experiences, and the 7 bright red handprints are particularly touching. On January 20, 2020, in front of this ancient street that was "resurrected", seven men pressed their bloody fingerprints and made a solemn oath. Since then, on the 20th of the first month of each quarter, this vow will resound through the ancient streets again.
"Search the roots of Boshan catering culture with awe, and devote 100% to explore the true taste of Yanshen Ancient Town, and swear to be a pioneer of inheritance and development..."
"To prepare a good dish and swear for future generations, this spirit alone is admirable." Many tourists sighed.
mentioned the experiences that 7 partners gathered together, and Fang Lijun was filled with emotion. He said: "Although they are all decisive and motivated now, they took nearly three years to get them together." Although Boshan Cuisine is in line with each other, each company has its own unique skills. Among the seven partners, there are both industry leaders and industry leaders. It is not easy to get these "big bosses" together on weekdays, let alone to bring them together in business. What made Fang Lijun feel gratified was that during the two years of partnership, the barriers and alienation caused by many things were eventually wiped out by the feelings and enthusiasm inspired by the paper oath.
As the only "outsider" among the 7 partners who do not know how to take control, the reason why Fang Lijun chose to invest over 100 million yuan to rebuild this ancient street and actively gave up profit sharing in his business was also due to the obsession hidden deep in his heart. In his opinion, although Boshan is the halo of the birthplace of Shandong cuisine, it has been influenced by regional culture that Boshan cuisine has tried to go out several times in history, but has not been successful.
"For a long time, the inheritor of Boshan catering culture has been in peace and working behind closed doors. The idea of being at ease with small wealth has become the biggest obstacle for Boshan cuisine to go out." Fang Lijun said: "The original intention of the partnership is to determine a common goal for everyone, both for the inheritance of Boshan catering culture and for the revitalization of Shandong cuisine ."
"The birthplace of pre-made dishes"
Shandong cuisine is one of the four major cuisines in China. It is also the oldest, richest and most skillful cuisine. As the birthplace of Shandong cuisine, the common saying "Eat Boshan rice and move around the world" has always been circulating in Boshan.
is like the "Boshan Tofu Box" produced by Lao Yanshen Food Ancient Street. A plate of roasted tofu is stacked in large pieces in all directions. A spoonful of red sauce is poured on it. A bite into lean meat, winter bamboo shoots, , mushrooms, and sea rice are chopped into powder and fried with onion and ginger. When the fried tofu is wrapped in golden shells, the fragrance is fragrant. After traveling to thousands of households, this famous Boshan dish also appeared on the table of the state banquet, which was very popular.
However, it is not easy to show the rich culture of Boshan’s diet, because in the traditional view, Boshan cuisine is a "big meal" and it is difficult to taste a special dish alone. How to split the special dishes in the "big cereal" and present them to tourists in the form of "snacks" while continuing the traditional taste. This is the first step in innovation.
With the joint efforts of 7 partners, Laoyanshen Food Ancient Street has not only achieved the phased goal of receiving more than 600,000 tourists annually, with an annual turnover of more than 10 million yuan, and more than 100 villagers, but also took the lead in the pre-made dishes.
In Fang Lijun's view, whether in terms of origin or production skills, Boshan cuisine has the innate advantage of becoming a pre-made dish. Because according to local customs, every time the Spring Festival comes, people in Boshan will always prepare a large amount of ingredients, a considerable number of which are made into semi-finished or finished products, waiting for the banquet for relatives and friends during the Spring Festival. Such as dry crispy fish, roll tips, meatballs, stir-fried belly, etc., these semi-finished or finished products, take out a few of them, or slice them directly into slices and put them on a plate, or pour them on the stock and cook them, and they can become a hard dish on the table.
As the most down-to-earth cuisine in Shandong cuisine, many classic dishes in Boshan cuisine evolved from folk home-cooked dishes. According to the Linzi County Chronicles, "Yiya is good at treating the five flavors, Zijing is hydrated, and you can know it." From this we can see that starting from Former Qin , Boshan was a place that is good at cooking. The "New Year dishes" cooked by the people at that time was the prototype of pre-made dishes today, which also became an important basis for Lao Yanshen Food Ancient Street to be recognized as the "born place of pre-made dishes".
"Today's Boshan pre-made dishes are actually the 'New Year' dish passed down from generation to generation by the older generation of Boshan people. What we want to inherit is not only the food culture that lasts for thousands of years, but also the trend of pre-made dishes to let Boshan cuisine go to sea by borrowing a boat to achieve the revitalization of Shandong cuisine." Fang Lijun said.
Enter the central kitchen , brand image store and production workshop located in Laoyanshen Food Ancient Street. The Boshan food culture that spans thousands of years collided and blended here. Boshan pre-made dishes have also completed the research and development of more than ten dishes represented by Shandong cuisine under the empowerment of historical culture and modern technology. In addition to this resurrected thousand-year-old street, Boshan District also timely put forward requirements to support the development of Boshan pre-made dishes and catering industries at the 2022 District Party Congress and Two Sessions, in order to gather forces from all parties to promote the standardization, branding and industrialization of Boshan cuisine pre-made dishes.
The full protection behind the solemn oath
Relive this paper oath under the tree embraced by "Lao Yan Shen" is related to food safety: "It is necessary to ensure real materials, fair prices, and consistent inside and outside." Looking back, Lao Yan Shen Food Ancient Street and 7 partners also fulfilled their oath with more than 30 single-product snacks in two years without a record of food safety violations.
How to keep the red line of food safety in more than 600,000 tourists every year and the future Boshan pre-made vegetable market? After walking through the three tunnels that Fanglijun took ten years to open, the reporter found the answer: among the mountains behind the Laoyanshen Food Ancient Street, the running of the three tunnels provides convenient transportation conditions for the scientific development of organic agriculture, and the hundreds of acres of greenhouses embedded in the mountains are particularly eye-catching.
From the source, whether it is the cultivation of modern organic food or the application of advanced peptide fertilizer technology, every new attempt here is to ensure the quality of the product.
Fang Lijun admitted that at present, the fruits and vegetables ingredients supplied by Lao Yanshen Food Ancient Street to tourists are basically derived from this. On the basis of fully ensuring the green, safe and healthy ingredients, the income of local villagers has also greatly improved.
"Without strict control over food safety, the inheritance of Boshan catering culture is just empty talk, let alone the lofty ambition to revitalize Shandong cuisine." Fang Lijun said.
At this point, the "Lao Yan Shen" spirit of seeking truth and pragmatism has also resonated with the entire Boshan catering industry, laying a solid foundation for the "going overseas" of Boshan pre-made dishes.At the same time, in order to vigorously develop Boshan pre-made dishes and support the local catering industry to become bigger and stronger, Boshan District has also established a Boshan catering industry development special team, led by the main person in charge of the Standing Committee of the Boshan District People's Congress, and the directors of the Bureau of Commerce, Culture and Tourism, and Market Supervision Bureau serve as deputy team leaders. All relevant departments, towns and streets, industry associations, and backbone enterprises participate in the special team work. There are three working groups for business, cultural and tourism integration, market supervision and work institutions of each town and street, and multiple departments use their respective expertise to promote it together.
uses such a high-standard special team to focus on catering, which is not only unprecedented in Boshan’s history, but also has no precedent for the food capital across the country.
In this regard, Lu Dezhi, secretary of the Boshan District Party Committee, introduced that Boshan, as the birthplace of Shandong cuisine, has unique advantages in the development of the pre-made vegetable industry. It is necessary to not only clarify the development positioning, build a development model of the pre-made vegetable industry that is in line with reality, and promote the high-quality development of the Boshan catering industry to achieve , but also insist on putting product quality first, and pay close attention to the quality control of pre-made vegetable products to ensure food safety.
At present, the pre-made vegetable industry and financial park project planned by Boshan District is about to emerge. Soon, an industry-education integration area and a pre-made food science and technology innovation industrial park will be born in the "borne place of pre-made vegetables". The prefabricated food science and technology innovation industrial park is expected to be combined with the existing specialty agricultural product cold storage in the southern mountainous area of Boshan , and introduce the cold chain logistics operator to help Boshan’s specialty agricultural products and prefabricated food go global and realize source production, storage, sales and direct access.
In Fang Lijun's view, Boshan pre-made dishes are currently the third one in the three puzzles of authentic ingredients, food skills and industrialization. If the combination of three puzzles can be achieved, the goal of Boshan’s pre-made vegetable industry to reach an output value of 3 billion in three years will definitely be achieved.
Standing at the moment of pre-made dishes of 100 billion yuan, Fang Lijun was very frank about the dreams in the hearts of their generation of old Boshan people: "It is our original intention of partnership to support a village with a ball, support a town with a steamed bun, and let the local people live a good life. What we have for the blood alliance is actually the responsibility of our generation for the inheritance of Boshan culture, the expectations for the development of the Boshan catering industry, and the honest and trustworthy way of doing business in Boshan people."
(reported by Dazhong Daily Client Reporter Ma Jingyang and Jiang Tao)
