For six-and-a-half-year-old Yang, the winter solstice in the 21st year of King Qin's reign was something he would never forget.
Yesterday, my father-in-law and uncle used the newly made "treading rice" to pound a stone of rice in one go, two-thirds of which were indica rice and one-third of which was glutinous rice. It was not enough to make brown rice, so they kept pounding it until evening.
After several times of sifting, all the rice bran and bran were removed, and white polished rice was obtained.
Father Zhong took two buckets each of the pounded indica rice and glutinous rice, put them in a pottery basin and soaked them in cold, clear well water. Then he picked up Yang and his sister Yue one by one, and kissed each of them.
Boasting that he would make delicious food for them tomorrow...
Just because of Zhongfu's words, the greedy Yang stayed up very late, wondering what the delicious food Zhongfu mentioned was.
"It must be caramel! I heard that Father Zhong sent my uncle to go to the market to buy caramel!"
His sister, Xiaoyue, who was only five years old, opened her eyes wide, and Yang seemed to be able to see her eyes full of stars under her forehead-length hair. They could only eat sweet and delicious caramel two or three times a year.
"It must have something to do with those rice." Yang Ze thought so.
In his eyes, those pounded polished rice are already delicious. Yang is at an age when he is easily hungry. When eating rice, he can swallow it in big gulps without worrying about getting a sore throat from the rice bran. But on weekdays, his father has to drag
I had to go to the field with an injured leg, and my mother was also very busy. She had to clean up the housework, weave cloth, and take care of my eldest mother, so there was no time for careful work.
Full of expectations, the two children fell asleep in a daze. When Yang opened his eyes again, it was already dawn the next day, and the winter solstice had arrived...
For their family, the winter solstice is not only a solar term, but also a special day.
The kind aunt (grandmother) always likes to hug the sun and the moon and talk about the past.
She said that her father-in-law was born on the day of the winter solstice. Coincidentally, to her uncle's surprise, he was also born on the winter solstice two years later. His birth was purely accidental. His eldest mother went to deliver food to her eldest father.
I was startled by a rabbit running past me, and suddenly came to this world...
So my eldest mother often joked about it, saying that my uncle was born in a hurry just to be born on the same day as his father-in-law.
Every time they hear this, Yang and Yue will curiously ask, how is the child born? Does it jump out of a stone? Or is it fished out of a well? Or is it transformed into a rabbit?
The adults all looked at each other and avoided talking about this.
But regarding the fact that Heifu and Jing were born on the same day, the aunt who lived in the countryside and knew the "Rishu" although she was illiterate and often set dates and times for people believed that they could be born on the same day in the same month.
People must be connected by lifeline. Heifu and Jing are not only brothers, but they are also destined to live and die together... It sounds ridiculous.
In short, the winter solstice is a bit special for their family, and this year it is even more special. All of this is because of Father Zhong!
When Yang rubbed his eyes and walked out of the room, he found that his mother and aunt were busy in the kitchen, lighting a fire and setting up a cauldron. There was also a wooden steamer for steaming rice on the cauldron. After the water in the pottery cauldron boiled, the water in the pottery cauldron was swollen.
The white rice is scooped into the steaming wooden steamer and steamed over high heat.
Soon, steam was billowing in the kitchen, and the thick aroma of rice continued to overflow from the kitchen, making Yang drool at the smell.
At this time, Father Zhong also bent down and entered the kitchen. Their family had been poor for generations, but they didn't know the weird rule of "a gentleman stays away from the kitchen". Father Zhong ignored the smell of fireworks and stifled the fire, squatted by the stove and fanned the fire, paying attention at the same time.
On fire.
When he shouted yes, his uncle and others came in together, lifted the wooden steamer, poured the steamed rice that was almost cooked, and poured it into the clean stone mortar while it was still hot.
Next, it was the funniest moment for Yang, when he saw his uncle Citron taking off his winter clothes, naked to the waist, and holding a big mallet, while Father Zhong stepped on the newly-made "treadmill".
The two of them first smashed the rice in the stone hammer, and then the uncle raised the mallet and pounded it hard. Father Zhong also noticed his rhythm and raised his feet to step on it. You hit me and I hit, the stone hammer and the wooden mallet came one after another. The ground fell into the mortar, and the hot rice was pounded continuously, making a "bang dong, bang dong" sound, turning it into a sticky rice ball...
Oh, it shouldn't be called rice balls, Zhongfu said to Yang, this thing is called "rice cake".
"I didn't eat it during the Chinese New Year, so I had to eat it during the Winter Solstice." Father Zhong said with a smile, but Yang didn't understand. In this case, why wasn't it called "Winter Cake"?
During this process, Zhongfu also allowed Yang, Yue, who had just woken up, and his uncle's and aunt's four-year-old daughter "Chen" to grab a handful of glutinous rice from the stone mortar, run to the side and eat it with relish. The three siblings held Go up, mouth covered with sticky rice grains, and finally pointed at each other, giggled, and started chasing each other in the yard, and then the big yellow dog in the front yard also joined in.
Uncle Jing looked at them and laughed. Normally, this little boy would have run over to play with them, but at this moment, he was assigned a task by Father Zhong. He squatted next to him and watched every time the gavel fell. During the break, the uncle quickly wet his palms with water, reached into the stone mortar, turned over the unbeaten rice balls, and covered the beaten parts.
The cycle goes on like this, and finally, it is pounded into a big solid ball, which is considered good.
By this time, Yang saw that his uncle was out of breath, saying that the work was really tiring, his arms were sore, and his mouth was numb. On the other hand, Zhong's father, who was operating the treadmill, did not blush and was out of breath, just like a normal person.
But I saw Father Zhong continuing to direct everyone, kneading the large rice cakes that had been pounded and placed on the long chopping board several times, then kneading them into several long strips, smoothing the wrinkles on them, and evenly applying a little hot rice cakes. Paste. Finally, I personally cut the long strip into dozens of roughly equal pieces with a knife, and then pressed it with a cutting board, and each round rice cake that resembled a dish appeared in front of me.
Father Zhong was even interested in carving a seal with a radish, holding the sun and the moon, and asked them to hold the seal with their little hands, and put it on the New Year cake, making a round and moon-shaped seal. Poke, it appears on the rice cake...
"I also want."
Xiaochen from her aunt's house was also carried to the table. Father Zhong made one for her, covered it on the rice cake, and left a five-pointed star...
"The round one is the sun, the curved one is the moon, and the five-pointed star is the chen. Isn't it fun?"
“Fun!”
Yang Heyue sat in Father Zhong's broad arms and couldn't help but widen their eyes. Chen Ye rode on Father Zhong's neck and screamed happily.
For the first time, the children discovered that the rice they eat every day can become so interesting!
"Not only is it fun, it's also delicious." Heifu laughed with three children hanging on his body.
In the next two thousand years, the diet of China will gradually change, and millet will slowly retreat from the leading role. Eventually, the north will become a world of wheat, while the south will always be the kingdom of rice.
Chinese people like to unify. The country does not divide the north and the south, but when it comes to food, they divide the north and the south and fight against each other.
In the eyes of northerners, southerners live a hard life, and they even feel sympathy for them.
But if we let the southerners speak for themselves, eating rice with delicious fish soup makes life enjoyable, but eating steamed buns and steamed buns every day is boring!
For southerners, steamed buns and noodles can be used as breakfast or late-night snacks, but the main meal requires a bowl of hot white rice to satisfy them for the day. In their eyes, rice is like an old wife
, hand in hand to enter the house, you can eat it even if you eat it for a hundred years; you are a concubine in front of you, and you are waiting in the outer room, and you only need to try something new every now and then. Northerners think that this relationship is probably reversed...
To put it bluntly, the difference in diet is just that the soil and water support the people of the same country. No matter what is grown in the ground, it must be made flavorful, vivid and colorful. This is the true nature of a foodie country.
In the same way, northerners have their own way of celebrating the New Year, and southerners have their own way of celebrating the New Year. Northerners have dumplings, while southerners have their New Year's Eve cakes.
Heifu was an authentic southerner in his previous life. By coincidence, this southern county, Anlu, is also the southernmost county of the Qin State. In a thousand years, this place will be "Huguang is ripe for the world", and it can also be regarded as a land of fish and rice. The crops are corn and rice.
Half and half, there is even some glutinous rice, but little wheat is planted.
So Heifu recalled the New Year celebrations in his hometown when he was a child in his previous life, and copied the lively scene of pounding rice cakes to more than two thousand years ago...
It's a pity that he didn't have time to grind the rice. He couldn't grind the rice into powder and then steam it, so he couldn't make serious rice cakes. These things in front of him were not so fine, so it seemed more appropriate to call them "獍粑"
.
However, the New Year scene that Heifu wanted, with the whole family working together to pound rice cakes, old and young, laughing and noisy, was real.
The children especially liked this scene. The three of them were chasing each other in the yard, shouting at each other, eating and playing, and they were so happy.
A family must have real warmth and unity in order to make sticky rice cakes!
"This is the life I want." Heifu couldn't help but sigh with emotion.
…
By this time, the physical work was almost done. Heifu picked out a part of the rice cake and asked his sister-in-law and sister-in-law to go back to the kitchen to steam it. After the hot rice cake comes out of the cauldron, it is soft and can be easily rolled into rice cake dumplings.
eat.
I was so frightened and anxious that I pulled a ball and stuffed it into my mouth. It was so hot that I screamed. Heifu slowly blew it to cool it down before putting it in my mouth. I couldn't help but close my eyes. The muscles felt so soft and waxy.
, making him extremely familiar and attached to it.
In addition to vegetarian food, you can also dip it into the malt candy that he bought at the rural market. It is so sweet in the mouth. The three children especially like it and eat it from ear to ear.
Xiaoyue still held a piece of rice cake dipped in caramel in her hands and handed it to Heifu's mother. She said in a sweet voice, "Mom, eat it." Her mother took it happily, but the rice cake was a bit sticky to the teeth.
The old man who was shaking was not very friendly. The mother just ate some casually and continued to serve the porridge. Looking at the scene of family reunion, this is the best delicacy for a mother...
Of course, rice cakes can also be dipped in sauce or salt, but Heifu does not advocate that way of eating.
"Sweet rice cakes are orthodox, salty ones are heresy!"
Heifu started to pull his nephew and niece, and said some strange things, but in front of him, he ate a piece of rice cake cooked with oil and salt in one bite, and said with a smile that the taste was sweeter.
Good...
Others also felt full after eating, and praised the taste of the rice cake, saying it was glutinous, fragrant, and refreshing.
In the past, they enjoyed happiness in the midst of hardship, but today, they enjoy happiness in the midst of sweetness.
The whole family sat together to finish the meal. Although the nobles in this era all practiced a separate meal system, each had a table in front of them and a bell to ring for the meal. However, the Heifu family has been poor for generations and did not even have a table to eat, but a wooden pillar in front of them.
, you can start eating just by squatting on the ground, why is there so much fuss?
Heifu actually likes this kind of atmosphere. This is probably the deep-rooted thinking of a later generation. He thinks it is good to sit together in groups. It is lively and intimate. After eating, they can sit and chat with each other. The one in the home of a noble family
This feeling of alienation and brotherly hostility does not exist here.
Poetry:
The two brothers are in harmony with each other, and they are happy and happy together.
The wife is harmonious, like a drum, harp, and harp. The brothers are both happy and harmonious.
Although there are no bells, cauldrons, or wine here, the laughter and laughter of the family are more beautiful than any other instruments in the world...
The night is getting darker, Heifu is happy today, and he is still educating his brothers on N ways to eat rice cakes.
"The remaining rice cakes can be dried in the winter and can be stored for a long time. You can slice them into slices, boil them, or grill them when you want to eat them. Just three or five slices will keep you full for the whole morning."
Heifu was talking here with great interest, but unexpectedly his elder brother smiled heartily and listened for a long time, and suddenly said with some melancholy: "My family has not been so lively for a long time since my father passed away..."
For a moment, the whole family was silent. Indeed, in the past few years, many things happened to their family, and in the end, they fell from a good middle-class family to the level of food and clothing.
Then, Zhong stood up and bowed to Hei Fu!
"Brother Zhong told me that day in the county that it would make our family's life better and better. I didn't believe it at the time, but now, brother Zhong, I really believe it!"
