It turns out that takeout was already available in the Song Dynasty! What did ancient takeout look like?

Science Fiction Network, January 30 (Jin Kaiyi) Nowadays, the development of the takeaway industry has greatly enriched our lives. We can enjoy a variety of delicacies at home with just a few clicks. However, you may not know that the takeaway service was already available in ancient times.

As a national treasure and one of the ten famous paintings handed down from ancient times, Along the River During the Qingming Festival fully reflects the living conditions of all social classes in the Northern Song Dynasty, and provides a window for us to understand the life of the people in the Song Dynasty. In Along the River During the Qingming Festival, there are shops such as "Sun Jia Zheng Store" and "Shi Qian Jiao Store", and there is also a brother who "delivers takeaways" with a bowl in his hand and looks around in front of the foot store to find the way.

According to records, if citizens in the Song Dynasty wanted to order takeout, they would send someone to a restaurant or a wine shop to order the dishes in advance, and then the waiter would deliver them directly to the door at the appointed time. Unlike the disposable tableware we use now, the tableware for takeout delivery in the Song Dynasty needed to be recycled, which is why the tableware for takeout delivery in the Song Dynasty was more particular.

The standard equipment for takeout in the Song Dynasty was a "warming plate", which was the "insulated box" of the Song Dynasty, used to solve the problem of keeping the food warm during delivery. The warming plate is a thick-bottomed, double-layered hollow plate. Pour hot water into the middle layer before use to keep the food warm. Others that play a similar role include wine warmers, warm bowls, etc.

You can't deliver food with a plate, so food boxes are also standard for takeout in the Song Dynasty. Food boxes usually have several layers, which makes it convenient for the store to put various dishes in different categories to prevent the dishes from mixing flavors. With the development of the economy, the appearance of food boxes has also changed from simple to "complex". For example, the ancients would pad the food boxes with cotton to achieve better insulation, and they would also spend time on the materials, production, and decoration of the food boxes to show their status and wealth.

In ancient times, people even used boats to deliver food. Menglianglu records that "boats were used to buy and sell soup, seasonal fruits, wine, vegetables, chickens, ducks, conchs, and tea." Moreover, the delivery speed of the takeaway boats was very fast. After the customer placed an order, the boat would deliver the food to the customer in a short time.