It is said that the food in "A Dream of Red Mansions" is the best in ancient and modern times, but the young ladies eat too much. When they eat crabs and roasted venison, they pay attention to the taste of literati and have no trace of gluttony. Eating here is just a pretext, admiring flowers and reciting poems is the highlight.
The diet in "Jin Ping Mei" is different. The foods that appear most frequently are cooked goose, roast duck, trotters, ribs, and fresh fish. It is purely about eating in the market, eating in a secular way, and there is no sense of separation when reading it. Because those things have been eaten by us people for hundreds of years and will always be loved.
During Shi Taijun's two banquets at the Grand View Garden, Grandma Liu took a bite of eggplant (xiǎng) and looked in disbelief: "Don't coax me, eggplant has such a taste!" Then she chewed carefully: "Although it has a little eggplant flavor, it doesn't taste like eggplant. Grandma, please tell me Tell me how to do it, and I will go back and do it."
Sister Feng said: "It's not difficult. Just peel the skin of the fresh eggplant, cut it into dices, fry it with chicken, and then use it. The preserved meat is combined with fragrant mushrooms, new bamboo shoots, mushrooms, spiced dried bean curd, and various dried fruits. Cut them into cubes, simmer them with chicken soup, collect the sesame oil, mix with the lees oil, and seal it tightly in a porcelain jar. When it's time to eat, take it out and mix it with fried chicken and melon. "
heard Grandma Liu calling Buddha, "It would take a dozen chickens to match it!" "
Here comes the question, can I make it according to the recipe of Wang Xifeng ? Someone actually tried it, but the "eggplant" they made was not delicious. Mr. Deng Yunxiang, who personally tasted the "eggplant" in Beijing Red Mansions Banquet, said, "It is not the food in "A Dream of Red Mansions" at all, but more like 'Kung Pao Chicken with Grilled Eggplant.'"
The food described by Cao Gong is not about eating, but about aesthetics. Just like the Grand View Garden, even if it is rebuilt according to the drawings, it may not be the Grand View Garden.
Baoyu was beaten and wanted to drink "the soup of Xiaoheyeer Xiaolianpenger".
Wang Xifeng said: "The taste is not noble, but it is a bit difficult to make. I borrowed the fragrance of new lotus leaves and relied on this good soup. I took out a few chickens in the kitchen and added other things to make about ten bowls. Why not take advantage of the situation and make some for everyone to eat? Lai Lian, I also want to try something new. "
To make this soup, you need a mold, which is more than a foot long and one inch square. It is carved with bean-sized chrysanthemums, plum blossoms, lotus pods, and water chestnuts. It is very delicate.
Aunt Xue said: "Your family is crazy, they want this for a bowl of soup!" Her family is an imperial businessman and can be considered wealthy, but in front of lotus leaf and lotus soup, she instantly transforms into Grandma Liu. Baoyu went to see Baochai , and ate the goosefoot duck and sour bamboo shoot soup, which are still common southern snacks and very homely. Lotus Leaf Lotus Soup takes a high-end literary and fresh approach, focusing not on what to eat, but how to eat it.
This is very aristocratic. The aristocrat even pays attention to Daiyu every step of the way and cares about it all the time. Because my mother said, "Grandma's house is different from other houses." There is a table for people to eat, and the maid next to them is holding a duster, a bowl, and a handkerchief. She coughs and finishes the meal in silence. There is a big stone lion at the door, a gesticulating caretaker with his chest raised, and a bunch of sedan horses. Grandma Liu wants to dust off her clothes and go to the corner door to talk.
is very particular about things. He doesn't speak well, doesn't eat well, and the eggplant doesn't taste like eggplant anymore.
People without rich life experience cannot write in this style.
If you don’t believe it, after reading it forty times, Gao E didn’t come up with a decent dish. The sick Daiyu ate "fire meat and cabbage soup", "rice porridge" and "five-spice kohlrabi" mixed with sesame oil and vinegar. Poor Daiyu, she still said it tasted good. A bowl of soup with a bowl of porridge and pickles also goes against common sense. This is a complete lack of understanding of life.
has also never been rich, but Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng is different.
He has endless love and curiosity for life. He happily wrote about eating, drinking, Ximen Qing's banquet, Pan Jinlian's snacks. The men and women who eat and drink in his paintings are steaming and lively.
Pan Jinlian had someone buy a jar of Jinhua wine, a pig's head and four hooves, and taught Laiwang's daughter-in-law Song Huilian to cook them.Song shaved and brushed the pig's head, mixed it with a large bowl of oil sauce, fennel and aniseed, and kneaded it. Using only a piece of firewood, it takes less than two hours to cook until the skin peels off and the flesh becomes tender. Served with a ginger and garlic saucer, put it on a large ice tray and bring it over. With this unique skill, Song Huilian will live in the hearts of many people.
is a mouth-watering sight. We really have no barriers to this kind of food. It can be seen that the tastes of Chinese people have not changed for thousands of years. This snack cost five taels of silver. Wen Xiucai, the secretary hired by Ximen Qing, had a monthly salary of 30 taels of silver. Chang Zhijie spent 35 taels of silver to buy a small courtyard. Ximen Qing was indeed wealthy.
But compared to Rongguo Mansion, it is still far behind. Grandma Liu accidentally dropped the pigeon eggs on the ground, each worth one tael of silver. Good guy, a plate of pigeon eggs in Rongguo Mansion can buy hundreds of pig heads! Spectacular!
In addition to Song Huilian brand pork head meat, Ximen's family usually eats roast duck, fresh fish, young pigeon, nothing more than chicken, duck and fish, which is full of market atmosphere.
Once, Earl Ying and Xie Xida were at Ximen Qing's house and ordered seven bowls of noodles at once, paired with garlic sauce and pork stew, which was very down-to-earth. During the episode "Pan Jinlian beats up and Sun Xue'e ", Ximen Qing wants to eat "lotus cake and whitebait soup" for breakfast.
It is said that whitebait has been a famous delicacy since the Spring and Autumn Period, and lotus cake, which sounds very literary, is just a common white flour pancake in the north.
That's right, Ximen Qing had pancakes, and Baoyu had lotus leaf and lotus soup.
lives elsewhere. Therefore, Qingwen asked sister-in-law Liu to make "fried wormwood with gluten", Tanchun and Baochai discussed "fried wolfberry sprouts with oil and salt", and gave the kitchen 500 yuan to make another one; Daiyu has a weak stomach and can only act as a bystander.
Grandma Liu came to Jia's house for the second time. She ate well and had a good time before leaving. She also "carried" a cart of things, but Ping'er told her: "Next time, bring the dried gray strips you dried and various dried vegetables such as cowpeas, lentils, eggplants, and gourd strips. We all like to eat them here." This kind of fun makes urban people yearn for farm life.
By the way, the green japonica rice is not the ordinary white rice, it is special. Wang Zengqi's "Eight Thousand Years" wrote: "A hoard of late rice fragrant japonica - this kind of rice is specially used for cooking porridge. When the porridge is cooked, the rice is half an inch long, light green like Biluochun, and has a strong fragrance. It is a specialty of Dongxiang Sanduo, with low output and extremely high price."
From here, the eating habits of "A Dream of Red Mansions" are more southern. Where is the staple food of Ximen Qing’s family? Usually pancakes, spring pancakes and noodles, obviously northerners. Some people say that Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng is from Jiangsu and Zhejiang areas, but I don't believe it.
Eat "Jin Ping Mei", it's steaming hot, cook according to the recipes in it, it's good quality and low price. Someone actually compiled the "Jin Ping Mei Diet Recipe", which is said to be very practical. However, it is difficult to cook the delicacies according to "Dream of Red Mansions". Not to mention eggplant and lotus leaf soup, even the side dish "pepper oil and water shield sauce" that Mrs. Wang gave to Jiamu during the Mid-Autumn Festival could not be prepared.
Cao Gong writes about eggplant, crabs, and lotus leaf and lotus soup. He writes about distant memories and nostalgia for a beautiful life. He is a drunkard who does not care about wine.
Just like in Proust's "In Search of Lost Time", the moment he tasted the "Little Madeleine" cake, the past time came rushing back, and he thought of Swann's garden and everything in Combray...
Desserts are not just snacks, and eggplant is not just eggplant.
Read "Jin Ping Mei" and watch them eat. What I see is loneliness and the endless desire of the heavy body. Reading "A Dream of Red Mansions" and watching them eat, what I see is sadness, the prosperity, youth and love that are gone forever.
As for Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng and Cao Xueqin, they write about eating and know how to eat. In their hearts, they have a passionate and desperate love for life.
