A seasoning that makes all boiled dishes delicious, thank you Hainanese people!

In the past two years, more and more niche new products have emerged in the hot pot market. In addition to Guizhou sour soup, the most eye-catching one is probably Hainan's " Zhazhu Vinegar Hot Pot ". It has a sour and slightly wine-flavored taste. It is not as instantly intoxicating as the spicy red oil, but it has a unique and charming fragrance with a lingering aftertaste.

If you haven't tried it yet, I really recommend it. It's not only delicious, but also much healthier than the spicy hot pot base.

Dregs of vinegar. Copyrighted images from the gallery, reprinting and using may cause copyright disputes

Fermentation

The sour vinegar

The emergence of lees vinegar is actually an "accidental product". It was originally sour vinegar made by fermenting the "waste" lees produced in the winemaking process . The people of Hainan found that using this lees vinegar as a soup base can make cooking, seafood, and any soup very delicious and appetizing, so "lees vinegar" gradually evolved.

At first, zaolu vinegar was only used to cook common ingredients such as seaweed, animal offal, shellfish and other common street snacks. Later, it was gradually paired with various seasonal seafood to make "zaolu vinegar seafood stew", and then slowly became the official match for seafood, and officially "evolved" into zaolu vinegar hotpot, which gradually became popular.

The combination of dregs vinegar and seafood can be said to complement each other. The sour taste and wine aroma brought by the fermentation of dregs vinegar can not only remove the fishy smell of seafood, but also greatly enhance the freshness. For some friends who prefer heavy tastes and think that seafood cooked in plain water is too light, seafood cooked in dregs vinegar is tasty enough; and for those who are worried about acne and constipation after eating spicy hot pot, dregs vinegar hot pot is also a good choice.

In addition, dregs vinegar also has two flavors, spicy and non-spicy, suitable for different groups of people. The non-spicy one is the "golden soup version of dregs vinegar" boiled with garlic and pumpkin puree, which is golden in color and tastes sour, fragrant, fresh and sweet, with rich layers; the spicy one is made by adding chili peppers, yellow lantern chili sauce and other chili sauces to the traditional dregs vinegar, which is sour, spicy and refreshing, and has the same delicious taste as Guizhou red sour soup.

Dregs vinegar

Great taste and good nutrition

The charm of dregs vinegar mainly comes from fermentation. The organic acids such as lactic acid and acetic acid, as well as various free amino acids produced during the fermentation process, not only form the unique sour and fresh flavor of dregs vinegar, but also have the effects of promoting appetite and improving digestion. These organic acids are also helpful in controlling the absorption rate of blood sugar in the intestine. People with diabetes or high blood sugar can also boldly try dregs vinegar , which has an extra layer of freshness and fragrance compared to ordinary vinegar.

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During the fermentation process, probiotics multiply in large numbers, which also brings many health benefits to people. For example, studies have found that lees vinegar contains a large number of lactobacilli, bifidobacteria and other probiotic bacilli. If these fungi can colonize in the intestines in large numbers, they can help regulate the intestinal flora, improve intestinal function, and have the effects of enhancing immunity and improving metabolism. In animal experiments, it was found that the lactic acid bacteria in lees vinegar were used for growth regulation of aquatic animals, which could improve the immunity of aquatic animals and promote their growth.

Compared with other hot pot dishes, the side dishes of Zaozu vinegar are also worth mentioning. Zaozu vinegar hot pot often uses small green tangerines and assorted sauce (a special sauce made from sesame paste, soy sauce, sugar, cooking oil, etc.) as the classic main ingredients, and is paired with chives, minced garlic, coriander, lemon juice, etc., to form a complex taste of sour, fresh, fragrant, salty and sweet.

Among them, the small green orange has many advantages.

In terms of taste, the addition of small green tangerines neutralizes the sweetness and saltiness of the assorted sauce with sourness, making the sauce taste more pleasant. In addition, small green tangerines have their own special aroma, which is also a unique way to relieve greasiness and remove fishy smells. It can also bring people an olfactory impact, and ultimately form a unique taste experience. Nutritionally speaking, small green tangerines are rich in vitamin C (46 mg/100 g), which not only has a good antioxidant effect, but also helps other ingredients stay fresh. In addition, the rich volatile oil components in small green tangerines, such as limonene, can also gently promote the secretion of digestive juices and can increase appetite to a certain extent.

It can be said that from the soup base to the side dishes to the ingredients, the dregs vinegar is just the right match. Every night when you have a poor appetite and everything tastes bland, it is very suitable to use dregs vinegar to rinse dishes or cook soup.

Moreover, the calories of dregs vinegar are not high , only 700-800 kilojoules per 100 grams. This is much lower than the 1500-3000 kilojoules/100 grams of red oil maocai soup base and the high fat content of "bone soup" spicy hot pot soup base. See, delicious dregs vinegar is also very friendly to people who want to lose weight!

Comparison of different hot pot bases. Image source: e-commerce platform

How to eat dregs vinegar

Good taste, comfortable stomach

For those who are not too familiar with dregs vinegar, you can start by trying the following methods:

1

The simplest: hot pot vegetables and seafood

On the way home from get off work, buy some fresh green leafy vegetables and prepare some small seafood. When you get home, wash them and you can eat them directly. It's very simple. If you are eating alone, you can also cook the vegetables and seafood in one pot with the soup base, which is faster.

2

Most homely: cooking noodles and rice noodles

When the temperature drops in autumn and winter, people always want to eat something hot. Cooking a bowl of noodles with dregs vinegar is very suitable. Paired with tomatoes, green leafy vegetables, mushrooms, shrimps and other side dishes, it not only makes the soup base more sour and fresh, but also increases the intake of vitamins and high-quality protein, making the nutrition quite balanced.

3

Most versatile: stew

If you like the taste of dregs vinegar, you may be willing to add a little bit to any soup after you get addicted to it. Fish stew makes the taste more delicious, ribs stew and chicken stew can relieve greasiness, and vegetable stew can increase the flavor. In a few minutes, the dishes you cook will become "the eye-catcher on the table" and be eaten up in seconds.

By the way, I have to remind everyone that if you are prone to excessive gastric acid secretion, or have gastrointestinal discomfort such as gastric ulcers and gastroesophageal reflux, you must pay attention to controlling the intake when eating dregs vinegar, not drinking or drinking less soup base, and also put less small green oranges to avoid aggravating the symptoms. After eating, you also need to carefully observe your body's reaction. If you feel uncomfortable, you should reduce the frequency of consumption.

In addition, if you look carefully at the ingredient list of dregs vinegar above, you will find that the sodium content is not low. In order to avoid the burden of "high salt", when using dregs vinegar for hot pot or cooking, you do not need to add salt, soy sauce, oyster sauce and other salty seasonings . Adjust according to your taste after cooking. Still pay attention to low salt and low oil to keep it light, after all, the taste of dregs vinegar itself is strong enough.

The season for hotpot is coming soon. Prepare the dregs vinegar base in advance at home, and you can invite three or five friends over at any time to have a low-fat, delicious, appetizing, easy to digest, brainless, easy to match, healthy and burden-free dregs vinegar hotpot!

References

[1] Wu Huiling, Ge Yingliang, Zhong Ruiwen, et al. Analysis of microbial diversity of Hainan lees vinegar based on Illumina PE300 high-throughput sequencing[J]. Journal of Food Safety and Quality, 2023, 14(9):49-58.
[2] Zheng Yu. Effects of lactic acid bacteria derived from dregs vinegar on growth and nonspecific immunity of brown-spotted grouper and white shrimp [D]. Hainan University, 2017.

[3] Ding Jie, Sha Rui, Wang Aixia, et al. Extraction of volatile oil from citrus peel and determination of limonene content in volatile oil from citrus peel by HPLC[J]. Hubei Agricultural Sciences, 2017, 56(17):5.

Planning and production

Author: Wang Lu, registered dietitian

Review丨Ruan Guangfeng, Deputy Director of Kexin Food and Health Information Exchange Center

Planning丨Yang Yaping

Editor: Yang Yaping

Proofread by Xu Lai and Lin Lin

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