Sichuan hot pot, known for numbing, spicy, fresh, fragrant, he comes from the folk, sublimation in the temple, whether it is peddlers and pawners, officials, literati, farmers and workers, or men and women, children and children, its consumer groups cover a wide range of per capita consumption times, are beyond him. As a kind of food, hot pot has become the representative food of Sichuan and Chongqing.
As of January 2023, Sichuan hot pot has been introduced to more than 50 countries and regions around the world, and chefs will adapt to local conditions and combine Sichuan hot pot with local eating habits. Chongqing, Zigong, Luzhou all put forward the “hotpot origin”.
1、The historical origin of Sichuan hot pot:
Sichuan hot pot appeared around the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty (1821-1851). After much research, the real birthplace of Sichuan hot pot is the Yangtze River – the wine city Luzhou Millet Beach (now Gaoba No. 2 Factory). The cooker is only a pot, the pot contains water (soup), with a variety of vegetables, and then add pepper, Sichuan pepper to remove the dampness (because there is “vegetables when three points of grain, pepper when clothes” said).
At that time, boatmen on the Yangtze River often stayed at Millet Beach (Millet Beach was a modest pier on the Yangtze River in Sichuan Province at that time). Stop the boat that fire cooking to drive out the cold, after the boatmen eat, the beauty is not at all (in their hearts), so spread ten, ten hundred, in the Yangtze River side of the docks spread.
At that time, Chongqing was a major waterway, which was much larger than Luzhou. This food custom has been inherited and passed down to Chongqing, and there has been a change. At that time, some coolies (” Bang bang “) saw this way of eating, and went to the cattle killing ground to pick up some of the discarded cow organs, wash them in the Yangtze River, cut them into small pieces, and eat them with the boatmen. Everyone found it delicious, filling and chilling. Later, some people simply use a pick (two) baskets, one put some cattle miscella (mainly with hair belly), small dishes, one put a mud stove, with a grid of “ocean iron basin” on the stove, the basin boiling with a kind of hemp, spicy, salty and fragrant gravy, every day in the river, bridge or street peddling. So these boatmen, coolies (bang bang) are no longer cooking their own fire, each identified a box, that is, hot that eat, until full, it does not cost much money, both economic, and convenient, and can increase the heat. In addition to those coolies, more and more people came to eat the burden. It was not until the twenty-third year of the Republic of China that someone moved it into a small restaurant, moved these sticks to the table, the mud stove was still, but the divided iron basin was replaced by a small red copper pot, the sauce and dipping sauce were coordinated by the diners themselves, in order to be clean and suitable for everyone’s taste, and gradually more and more such small restaurants were opened, and almost all of them were in a small street on the opposite side of Chongqing, Jiangbei. Later, in order to remember that this way of eating came from Millet Beach, people simply called this street “Millet Street”.
Even later, to the Anti-Japanese War period, Sichuan hot pot increasingly prosperous, officials, financial giants, businessmen, journalists and so on to eat hot pot proud, some people also put this hot pot restaurant noble. Many Kuomintang veterans who went to Taiwan on the eve of the founding of New China are still obsessed with the delicious Chongqing hot pot, and some have opened hot pot restaurants in Taiwan (but because of the problem of raw materials, they can’t catch up with the local taste of Sichuan). So many books say that Sichuan hot pot originated in Chongqing Jiangbei, but the fact is from Luzhou, developed in Chongqing.
2、Cultural characteristics of Sichuan hot pot:
Sichuan hotpot is a testament to the inclusiveness of Chinese cooking. The word “hot pot” is not only the name of cookware and utensils, but also the unity of techniques, “eating” method and utensils and utensils. It shows the harmony of Chinese food. From the use of raw materials, soup ingredients to the coordination of cooking techniques, the same in seeking differences, different in the sum, so that meat and vegetable, raw and cooked, spicy and fresh sweet, crisp and soft, fragrance and concentrated alcohol wonderful combination. Especially in the folk customs, the scene and psychological feeling of harmony and smooth integration are presented, creating a cultural atmosphere of “concentric, gathering, sharing and enjoying”. It has greater popularity. In Sichuan, up to the officials, down to the people, all prefer Sichuan hot pot, every family will do.
Unique seasoning
First put the butter into a hot pot to boil, in the bean chop into, to boil into sauce red oil, accelerate stir-fry pepper, and then mixed with beef soup, add mashed black beans and crushed rock sugar, ginger, add Sichuan salt, glutinous rice wine and small pepper boil.
In addition, beer flavor, sauerkraut flavor and seafood flavor types, different hot pot varieties, there are different hot pot juices and different seasonings, the number can reach more than 30 kinds. In addition, there are many dishes attached to Chongqing hot pot, which can be prepared with sesame oil, oyster sauce, cooked vegetable oil, soup and monosodium glutamate, garlic paste, egg white, etc., and the hot dishes are dipped in to eat, both to reconcile the taste, and to reduce fire and produce fluid.
Variety of dishes
Traditional Maodu hot pot consists mainly of cow’s maodu.
Today, the selection of all kinds of hot pot, dishes have developed to hundreds of kinds, including the edible things in the food kingdom, dishes have expanded to poultry, aquatic products, seafood, game, animal offal, all kinds of vegetables and dried fresh fruit and so on. On the basis of hairy belly hot pot, it has developed to clear soup hot pot, Mandarin duck hot pot, beer duck hot pot, dog meat hot pot, beef hot pot, spicy chicken hot pot, etc., there are more than 100 varieties, and Western hot pot prepared for foreigners.
Eat uninhibitedly
In the old hot pot restaurant, the special tall table and stool, under the iron and copper pot, the charcoal fire is raging, the soup in the pot is rolling, and the diners are commanding, staring at the dishes in the pot, raising their glasses and waving their chopsticks. Especially in the summer of the pot, sweating in the fire, eat hard to take off the shirt shirtless. Chongqing people eat hot pot bold and the trend of swallowing mountains and rivers can not be compared with other areas, which is the embodiment of Bayu food culture, is the performance of the ancient Ba nation brave and bold character and food culture psychology.
Today’s hot pot has been modernized, hot pot soup from the traditional red soup to red and white soup, seafood soup, medicinal soup, hot and sour soup; There are whole beef pot, whole sheep pot, dragon flying Phoenix pot, dog meat pot, fish head pot, duck hot pot, chicken hot pot, Shanzhen pot, porridge bottom pot and cold hot pot. The seasoning appeared in the oil dish, sesame oil dish, dry oil dish, garlic oil dish, tea oil dish, egg white dish, etc., beautiful. In the hot pot equipment and fuel have been greatly improved, eat Chongqing hot pot fun and bold style, only immersive, personally taste to experience.
3, Sichuan hot pot use notice:
Ensure hygiene:
Ensure that the ingredients are cooked properly to eat hot pot, pregnant women are best to choose to eat hot pot at home, so that not only can control the taste of the soup, try not to be spicy or taste too stimulating, but also to ensure the hygiene of the food.
Although the hot pot is delicious, we should pay attention to health and science when eating hot pot. First, pay attention to the selection of fresh materials to avoid food poisoning. Second, we must master the heat, if the food is burned in the pot for too long, it will cause damage to the nutrients and lose the umami; If you do not wait for the heat to boil to eat, and easy to cause digestive tract diseases. In addition, should be careful not to roll soup to eat, otherwise easy to burn the mucosa of the mouth and esophagus.
Pay special attention to:
Pregnant women may have vomiting and nausea during early pregnancy, so the stomach’s digestive capacity is naturally reduced. When eating hot pot, expectant mothers should slow down their eating speed and reduce the amount of food if they have poor appetite, so as to avoid indigestion and discomfort after eating.
How to eat:
With so many features, how can we enjoy them? Here’s how to eat it first. The way to eat hot pot is different from Chinese food, not to have cooked dishes on the table can be eaten; Instead, some semi-finished dishes are brought to the table by their own hands (cooking), self-ironing and self-eating; The hot (cooking) temperature of dishes is in the hands of diners. Therefore, diners must understand how to eat Sichuan hot pot in order to eat well.
How to eat:
Shabu: The material is to be clamped and boiled in the pot. The key is: First of all, we must distinguish between various materials, not all kinds of materials can be boiled. Generally speaking, the texture is tender and crisp, and the materials that are instantly cooked are suitable for hot (shaper) food, such as duck intestines, waist slices, liver slices, pea seedlings, spinach, etc.; And the texture is a little denser, not easy to cook in an instant, to be hot for a while, such as hair belly, mushroom liver, beef slices, etc.; Secondly, we should observe the changes of soup brine, when the soup brine boiling, constantly rolling, and soup brine oil is sufficient, hot food taste and heat preservation; Third, to control the heat, heat too much, the food will become old, heat is not, it is raw; Fourth, the food must be held firmly when hot, otherwise it will fall into the pot, and it will be easy to cook and boil.
How to cook:
Boil: that is, put the ingredients into the soup and cook. The key is: first of all, we must choose the materials that can be cooked, such as belt fish, meatballs, mushrooms and other raw materials that have a tight texture and must be heated for a long time to eat; Secondly, we must master the heat, and some should be boiled for a long time and boiled.
Eating experience:
The experience of eating hot pot should be meat and vegetable first, hot food soup must be rolled away, to all immerse in the soup hot food; The second is to adjust the spicy flavor, the method is: like spicy, can be hot food from the edge of the hot pot oil; On the contrary, cook from the boiling place in the middle; Once again, when you eat hot pot, you must be accompanied by a cup of tea to appetizer, remove oil and greasy, change your taste, and reduce the feeling of spicy.
