Beijing people are famous for their exquisiteness. Pay attention to manners, pay attention to noodles, pay attention to eating, pay attention to play... This is the "blood" left over from the ancient capitals of the three dynasties, and it is also an attitude of life that is not going to end.
From August 15 to the 15th of the first month of the lunar calendar, the season starts from late autumn to winter. This is the time when people in Beijing cook mutton. The meat-shabu shops on the streets and alleys are full.
At this time, the fat and lean sheep are suitable, which is the time when the meat is the most delicious. Warm mutton is still a good warming ingredient. On the first day of "Counting Nine", after eating a pot of steaming mutton, you are ready for the long winter.
As the saying goes, people take food as their heaven, and eating is the most basic thing in people's lives, and the eating habits are different in each place in China.
Take Beijing people as an example. They pay attention to not eating from time to time, that is, what kind of food they will eat when they arrive. For example, after the winter solstice every year, Beijing people will start to eat mutton, because eating mutton in spring and summer is more irritating , Easy to get angry, but after the winter solstice, it will be different. Eating mutton will not get angry, but also has a tonic effect.
The mutton in old Beijing is familiar to everyone, because this mutton has now become a business card of Beijing cuisine. Like many people who travel to Beijing nowadays, in addition to Beijing roast duck, mutton is also a must-eat delicacy. one.
For old Beijing, when it gets cold, it's time to eat mutton. Big copper pot, red charcoal fire, with neatly cut, thin mutton rolls, and dipped in the fresh and mellow sesame sauce. The satisfaction that this warm energy brings is no substitute for the taste of mountains and seas.
And this old Beijing mutton is very different from the hot pot. The mutton is more delicate than hot pot. The sauce alone is very particular about the "old eight pieces", using sesame sauce, soy sauce, green onion, coriander, green onion, and leeks. The dipping sauce made of flowers, soy tofu and braised shrimp oil really tastes very different. The flavor is fragrant and makes people mouth-watering.
According to legend, Kublai Khan’s mutton was invented. It is said that during a battle, Kublai saw that the soldiers were nostalgic for homesickness, so he asked the cook to prepare the mutton. At this moment, the army was about to pull out suddenly, but the soldiers were still hungry, cook. In desperation, cut the lamb into thin slices and rinse in the pot.
waited for the flesh to turn white and served it, sprinkled with fine salt, and distributed it to the soldiers. Unexpectedly, it won everyone's approval. Later, Kublai Khan won the battle. At the celebration banquet, the chefs prepared them according to the law and served them with delicious dipping sauces. They were given the name "Shubu Lamb", which has since become a famous court delicacy. The
copper pot pays attention to
old Beijing mutton, the pot must be a copper pot, and the meat must be mutton
. The copper pot is resistant to high temperature and is very suitable for hot pot pots. The copper pot head of the old Beijing Lamb Lamb has a large bottom and a large body. It is divided into three parts. The upper part is a heart-shaped chimney, the middle part is a basin-shaped pot body, and the lower part is a furnace-type bracket. When using it, add the bottom soup to the pot. Then put the red-burning charcoal into the charcoal stove for heating, and you can add the bottom soup whenever you eat.
The old Beijing lamb hot pot uses a boiler-integrated copper hot pot, a red copper-colored vertical pot body, a conical stove in the middle, and an iron clip used to control the heat on the high chimney.
In the past, when you ate charcoal-boiled mutton, you could stick the mutton slices on the copper wall and roast it out. The mutton flavor in such hot pot soup is very strong. The
copper pot has excellent thermal conductivity, and the heat of the charcoal fire is quickly and evenly transferred out. The water next to the stove evaporates quickly, sizzling, and the soup bottom is tossing like waves. Adding ingredients can always be cooked as quickly as possible, so that the effect of "shabu" can be achieved, and the taste of the ingredients will be more tender and delicious.
is the same as the famous beef hot pot in Chaoshan, and the lamb used for mutton in old Beijing is also very particular. Lamb is generally selected from Inner Mongolia. The prairie sheep are cooked as soon as they are cooked, and they will not grow old for a long time. It should be cut by hand, and the fascia should be removed when cutting, so that it is evenly fat and thin. The texture is clear, neat, naturally stretched, and red and beautiful.
The soup base is exquisite.
The soup base of the old Beijing lamb is exquisite "one cup of water, two or three green onions and ginger", and some will add some fresh but not smelly ingredients, such as shrimp, longan, wolfberry, lily, etc . When shabu-shabu, put a piece of mutton oil to make a fragrance, and then shabu-shabu.
is different from other hot pots with heavy oil and spicy bottoms. The old Beijing lamb soup uses boiled water, a bit of ginger and green onions., Shiitake mushrooms, wolfberry, jujube, are all the contents of the bottom of the pot.
It is said that the bottom of the pot was originally made from broth. Later, because of competition from various businesses, some people thought of launching a clear soup pot bottom to prove that their own mutton is good, and it gradually became popular. The so-called "good meat with clear soup". The more high-quality mutton
is, the more simple and ultimate clear broth is needed to bring out the deliciousness of the meat itself. The light soup of the clear soup and the freshness of the mutton, the two are not competing or fighting, harmonious and unified, this is a Chinese-style gourmet wisdom.
The meat is exquisite.
is laid on a blue and white plate. The pattern of the plate can be seen through the slices of meat. The plate must be dry and not run out of water. The plate must not be scattered or turned over. Shabu meat should not have foam, the more the soup, the clearer. Lamb that meets the above requirements is the top grade.
There are eight parts of old Beijing mutton that are usually rinsed, namely, the upper brain of the sheep, the sheep trigeminal, the mutton loin, the mutton crotch, the sinker, the cucumber strips, the mutton tendons and the mutton.
Sheep upper brain: Located behind the neck, on both sides of the spine, in front of the ribs, it is called "upper brain" because it is close to the head. The fat in the meat is evenly mixed, distributed like marble mottling, and the texture is tender.
Sheep Trident: The meat of the leg of lamb, the whole piece of meat forms a "Y" shape, so it is called a trident, which is divided into a large trident and a small trident.
The big three forks are the hind legs of the lamb, which are fat but not greasy, and are very tender and melt in the mouth; the small three forks are the parts of the front legs of the lamb.
Sheep loin: On both sides of the spine of the lamb, the small long strips of meat close to the back of the spine, with slender fibers, this part of the meat is thinner and has a tender taste, which is not suitable for long rinsing.
Sheep grinding crotch: butt-point meat, soft texture, lean, connected with muscles. Because it depends on the part of the sheep's tail, it is the freshest and the easiest to mutate.
One head Shen: A piece of meat on the outer side of the lamb's thigh. Compared with the large three-headed meat, one head has a higher proportion of lean meat and is more tender.
Cucumber strips: It grows on the thighs and buttocks of the lamb, and wraps the femur in a strip shape. A piece of meat has two colors, and there are two on a lamb. The flesh is reddish, and the taste is very tender.
Sheep tendon: The tendon meat is the muscle on the thigh. It is pure lean meat. The meat is very elastic, with tendons in the meat, which is very chewy.
mutton meat: the loin meat with the ribs removed, the taste is crisp and fragrant.
like to eat lean, you can order tenderloin, cucumber strips, grinded crotch; if you like fat, you can order brain, three-pronged, heavy head; if you like to eat thin, crispy, you can order tendon, mutton. The speciality of
sesame sauce
sesame sauce dipping is the soul of hot lamb.
If you want to taste good mutton, it is not enough to just mutton. After all, it is a clear soup. At this time, you need a bowl of delicious dipping sauce, and the dipping sauce that can complement the mutton is sesame sauce.
sesame sauce with hot lamb will not cover the meaty aroma of lamb, but also cover the mutton smell. The aroma of sesame is mixed with the meaty aroma of lamb, and the taste is mellow and beautiful. The cold sauce can instantly blanch The lamb cools down and makes it suitable for the mouth. Sesame sauce is the most common dipping material for northern hot pot and the most important dipping material for mutton-shabu.
The sesame sauce of old Beijing lamb is usually a blend of peanut butter and sesame sauce, the ratio is almost 2:8. The water of the old store sesame sauce is boiled with licorice, bay leaf, codonopsis, etc. In the
family, we usually use clean water, add a little bit of water until it is boiled, then add leek sauce, fermented bean curd, oyster sauce, shrimp sauce, sesame seeds, etc., and stir well. For the shabu-shabu, we usually only dip it to one-third of the meat. It is salty and light, with a proper combination.
is exquisite in eating methods
has the most exquisite ingredients, cooking utensils and dipping materials, but it is only half done. How to eat is also a university question. Beijing gluttons often cook a few slices of lamb's tail in a fat pot to make the soup more delicious. Then began to shabu the meat.
When the meat is cooked, the meat is cooked separately. Clamp it in boiling water with chopsticks and gently shake it, three times to the left and three times to the right. The meat will be cooked until the flour is cooked. Put it on a plate, pour some of the prepared dipping sauce and eat it. Many people like to eat directly with the dipping sauce, which is also very beautiful, but after eating it, the dipping sauce becomes thin and the taste will be greatly reduced.
After cooking the meat, you can take a short break and eat two cloves of sugar and garlic to relieve the greasiness.
Then you can cook the dishes.
nowThere are many kinds of vegetables, and there are many choices, but the classic "three sets" must be eaten: cabbage, tofu, and vermicelli. They are light and can absorb the fresh fragrance of lamb soup without destroying the original taste.
After finishing the cooking, I have to eat some staple food. Pour the miscellaneous noodles into the soup base full of savory mutton and cook, then take the remaining ingredients in the bowl, and then order the soup, order a freshly baked sesame sesame biscuits with crispy outside and soft inside and fragrant mouth.
slowly finishes eating noodle soup one bite at a time. In Beijing dialect, "Sliding" fills all the gaps in the stomach.
is especially good with snacks.
is popular when eating Sichuan-Chongqing hot pot with small crispy meat. Do you know what snacks to go with when eating old Beijing hotpot? Motofu is a snack often accompanied by Beijing lamb mutton. It is made from mung bean dregs after fermentation. It is fried with mutton oil and eaten with chili oil.
In addition, sugar garlic, soy sauce, and bean noodles are also snacks that are often ordered when mutton is cooked. The staple food of mutton soup is biscuits and mixed mung bean noodles, and the sour plum soup with a long history is the perfect drink for mutton soup in old Beijing.
Conclusion
Yi Zhongtian said that hot pot heat means intimacy, hot pot circle means reunion, hot pot uses soup to treat the raw materials, which means that the hot pot is soft and strong, the hot pot has five flavors, the main ingredients and ingredients are infiltrated, reflecting the beauty of neutralization, hot pot is not the food in the pot , But human affection and blood. In this cold, late autumn, quickly invite three or five friends to have a meal of mutton-shabu.
