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Written by Wei Shuihua Header Image | Daily Food Diary In the early 1990s, at the entrance of a Chinese supermarket in San Francisco, a thin old woman in her seventies stopped at the entrance of a Chinese snack shop. Her teeth were already decayed, and the doctor advised her to eat less foods with high starch content, but the Chinese characters "Liu Ji Scallion Pancake" still caught her eye. Although the oil was vegetable oil, not the fragrant lard; the scallions were also the popular chives in the United States, not the common shallots in China. But the combination of the two words "scallion oil" naturally expressed her thoughts about her hometown. She said: "The taste is not as good as that of Shanghai, but it is really a timely help to relieve my homesickness." The old woman's name is Zhang Ailing. In China's 9.6 million square kilometers of land, differences in taste, ingredients, and cooking techniques present distinct geographical adaptability. The so-called "Chinese food" rarely has commonalities in taste and appearance, and more often represents a wide range of food communities based on national identity. But scallion oil may be an exception: Allium plants and oils, two ingredients with huge differences in taste, form, and quality, become a match made in heaven as long as they are in the hands of the Chinese: Whether it is the scallion pancakes, scallion crisps, and scallion noodles of the common people, or the elegant scallion chicken and scallion meat, or the scallion sea cucumber and scallion shad that are popular in the house, after adding a spoonful of sautéed scallion oil, they all become authentic Chinese flavors. The lone sail is far away in the blue sky, and the whole country loves scallion oil. Figure/Penguin Food and Drink Guide No.1 From the perspective of botanical classification, onions, leeks, garlic, and shallots are all close relatives of the same family. They are naturally rich in irritating ingredients called allicin or onion. In fact, both allicin and onion are sulfur compounds composed of propylene sulfide, propylene disulfide, thiol and other ingredients in different proportions. People with a sensitive sense of smell often avoid people who have chewed onions or garlic, describing them as having "shit in their mouths." To a certain extent, this is not wrong, as sulfides also make a considerable contribution to the smell of excrement. Monks cannot eat the "five meats" because they believe that these pungent smells affect people's spiritual practice.
But the amazing thing is that the disgusting allium and garlic will undergo a complete transformation after being heated and exposed to oil. Fat and sulfide quickly decompose and combine to become new flavor substances, with the aroma of fat and onion lingering around, which is a temptation that most people can hardly resist. People have similar tastes, and this highly compatible combination of ingredients is actually widely available around the world. The Japanese use chopped green onions with miso soup, relying on the oil in soybeans and fish to stimulate the onion aroma; the French add minced garlic to olive oil and mayonnaise, and eat it directly as a dish with bread; the most indispensable ingredients in Indian curry are onions and garlic, which are the protagonists of aroma; the British and Americans are more direct, eating fried onion rings. In essence, the internal logic of these foods is the same: onions and garlic are heated together with oil to extract the flavor substances. But Chinese scallion oil is completely different from them. It is more than a dish, a condiment or a cooking method. From a higher dimension, scallion oil is one of the basic elements of Chinese cuisine. The scallions, which have a lighter smell than garlic and leeks, are enhanced by lard to present the virtues of being elegant, humble, gentle and introverted in the Chinese worldview. Together with the red chili oil, it constitutes the Chinese cuisine's table thinking of being both civil and martial, and making light of heavy tasks; it also outlines the Chinese philosophy of combining hardness and softness, and being brave and courageous.
No.2 “葱” is perhaps the earliest simplified Chinese character. Before the Han Dynasty, it was written as 蔥, which is related to the word “聰”, which means sharp ears and eyes, and describes the appearance of scallion being straight on the outside and hollow on the inside.
But at the latest in the 5th century, the word "cong" had already appeared in documents and was used interchangeably with "scallion". Hundreds of years later, it completely replaced "scallion" and became the standard character today. Obviously, "rush" is a more accurate ideographic symbol. Perhaps it was because people discovered the biological characteristics of the annual herbaceous plant onion, which withers and flourishes in an unpredictable manner, or perhaps it was because people gradually mastered the cooking essentials of onion, which is easy to mature and quick to cook. More importantly, Chinese people are increasingly aware that not all onions are hollow, such as green onions.
The Guanzi records: "In the fifth year of Duke Huan's reign, he went north to attack the Shanrong and obtained winter onions and Rong peppers, which he spread throughout the country." Rong peppers may be Sichuan peppers native to the eastern foothills of the Himalayas. Winter onions are green onions native to Siberia. Although the legend that Duke Huan of Qi obtained two important spice plants through a foreign war is quite fabricated, it is certain that the early spread of green onions was deeply related to tribal wars and land annexation.
The prosperous and affluent Qi and Lu regions may have become the concentrated consumption area of green onions since then. Green onion rolls, green onion fried meat, cold green onions, green onion fried tofu, green onion fried sea cucumber... Although it is not an official abbreviation, the Green Onion Province is by no means a false name. In the Book of Rites, which also appeared in Shandong and was written at the same time as Guanzi, there is another more interesting sentence: "Use green onions in spring and mustard in autumn", which means that raw meat slices should be eaten with green onions in spring and mustard in autumn: obviously, spring green onions are the most tender and fragrant, and autumn mustard is the most intense. These two stimulating condiments can effectively cover up the fishy smell of raw meat, and meet with the fat in the meat to form a longer-lasting taste. Exquisite.
No.3 After the unification of Qin and Han, the army and culture of the Central Plains dynasty began to appear in the distant western regions. In Chinese history, the only place named after the word "Cong" is the Congling Mountains, which is "eight thousand miles west of Dunhuang". Later, its name became "Pamir".
For most Chinese people, the Pamir Plateau is a distant and unreachable land. Only in the Han and Tang dynasties, the power of the Central Plains could reach there, which hides the Chinese people's yearning for distant lands and powerful empires. Although the high-altitude and arid Pamir Plateau is not a paradise for allium plants, using it as a place name not only indicates the spread of allium plants, but also reflects the Central Plains people's love for onions as a food ingredient.
Today, the Kashgar region, adjacent to the Pamir Plateau, has become one of the most important scallion producing areas in China. The huge temperature difference and long sunshine hours have shaped the sweet and strong flavor of Shache scallions, and also made the locals fall in love with the taste of scallions. Whether it is stir-fried mutton with scallions or scallion oil and meat naan, the fat of Maigaiti Duolang sheep can stimulate the unparalleled scallion fragrance. This is the most unmissable taste in Xinjiang. Most people don't know that scallions are not native to this place. Another important onion is the protagonist introduced from this place to China: shallot.
This onion, with short and thick stems and leaves and a swollen base, looks like a combination of leeks and garlic. Historically, it was an important diplomatic gift between countries, and its cultivation sequence and status on the table are self-evident. But the irony is that today's shallots have basically withdrawn from the sequence of crops, and instead appear as wild vegetables in the Yangtze River Basin with lush water plants. In Changzhou, Jiangnan, every family eats shallot stewed tofu on the night of the winter solstice. The so-called "stewed" means slow cooking. The method is very simple. Stir-fry the minced pork to release the oil, add the shallot whites and stir-fry into scallion oil, then add the old tofu that has been fried on both sides until golden brown and stew together. Sprinkle a handful of shallot leaves before serving, which is clear and white, with good color and taste.
In the Xiangxi mountainous area of Huaihua, Hunan, people like to cook a kind of "community rice" for sacrifice in spring. The rice is stewed with bacon and preserved tofu, and when it is almost cooked, add the fried wormwood and shallots and mix well. The freshly cooked community rice is eaten by the ancestors. After the sacrifice, the rice is cold and needs to be fried again. But the beauty is that the community rice is more fragrant after being fried, and the aroma of wormwood, meat, beans and shallots is intertwined in the rice. This is a beautiful memory for many children in Xiangxi.
Although it is called "wild vegetables", it is completely different from the common amaranth and shepherd's purse. The main battlefield of shallots is those carefully prepared dishes and offerings to ancestors. Indistinctly, the shadow of those ancient food customs can still be seen. The decline of shallots on the table has a lot to do with the rise of another kind of shallot: shallot. In the "Four People's Monthly Orders" written in the Eastern Han Dynasty, it is recorded that the people at that time planted "turnips and mustard, grazing, large and small shallots, garlic, shallots" and many other crops during the hot summer in July. Interestingly, the ranking of shallots was already after shallots and shallots at this time.
There is no document recording when and where the “scallion” came from. According to gene sequencing, it has the genetic characteristics of both green onions and shallots, and is likely to be a new variety selected by the Chinese ancestors through hybridization and breeding of allium plants. However, from the application level, the scallion, which looks more mediocre and fragile, has become the winner in the end. This is related to the fact that shallots are easy to cultivate and are not picky about the soil; but it is more likely related to the fact that oils and fats began to be consciously involved in Chinese cooking.
No.4 China is not a big producer of edible oil. For agricultural civilizations, meat is relatively precious and animal fats are not easy to obtain. Among China's native crops, oil crops are relatively scarce, mainly soybeans with extremely low oil yields and rapeseed with extremely low harvest rates. Before sesame, walnuts, peanuts, corn, sunflowers and other foreigners entered China, edible oil was limited to the aristocracy to cook expensive ingredients or to use for military fire attack equipment and chariot mechanical lubrication. It had nothing to do with the common people and cheap vegetables. Before the Qin and Han Dynasties, onions played the role of matching those oily meats. There was no real "onion oil", but an encounter by chance.
However, in the Northern Wei Dynasty's "Qimin Yaoshu", there appeared a good dish: "How to fry chicken eggs. Break them and put them in a copper pan, stir until the yellow and white are mixed. Finely chop the scallion whites, add salt, rice and fermented black beans. Fry with sesame oil. It is very fragrant and delicious." This may be the first time that the Chinese consciously recorded the use of scallion oil. And the object of its seasoning is exactly what everyone loves and flowers bloom: scrambled eggs. From the quality analysis of ingredients, sesame oil is not a good match for making scallion oil dishes. Sesame itself is a plant spice, and its fragrance is too strong and abrupt, which will cover up the scallion fragrance. Lard is the best partner for scallions. The long and charming taste brought by animal fats and fats does not conflict with the fragrance from herbs, but complements each other. However, combined with the production level of the Wei and Jin Dynasties, vegetable oil is the best solution for the common people to try scallion oil dishes. Especially sesame with an oil yield of more than 50%, you can't wait to squeeze the oil out of it. This oil crop from the Western Regions greatly reduced the cost of scallion oil, turning the "spring onions" in front of the old Wang Xie Hall into scrambled eggs with scallion oil in ordinary people's homes. What’s more interesting is that shallots also stood out during this period, gradually replacing chives and becoming the most important herb in Chinese cuisine. If replacing gentle and delicate animal oil with sharp-smelling vegetable oil is a compromise of food under realistic conditions, then replacing chives with shallots, which have a lighter flavor but are more inclusive, is the wisdom of the Chinese people to make progress by retreating under compromise. From then on, scallion oil became a delicacy that everyone, regardless of income level, age or gender, could enjoy.
The Hu Bing from the Western Regions has removed many spices and only uses a layer of scallion oil. After repeated overlapping, rolling, and baking, it has become the delicious scallion pancake.
The knife fish from the lower reaches of the Yangtze River abandons the complicated cooking method, is simply steamed, and drizzled with a thin layer of scallion oil, with its original flavor. This is the simplest and most advanced dish in Chinese cuisine. The free-range chicken from the Nanling Mountains is young, with crispy skin and tender meat. It is cooked, soaked in ice water, chopped into small pieces, and eaten with scallion oil and black bean sauce. Yuan Mei said it tasted like "Tai Geng and Xuan Jiu", and Cai Lan said it was "food for the gods".
Oysters from the Jiaodong Peninsula are at their plumpest in winter. You can pry them open, fill them with scallion oil and minced garlic, and slowly grill them over charcoal until they bubble up and the water and oil blend into one. Then swallow them whole while they're hot. They're much more delicious than eating them raw.
This is a food map that showcases the diversity of Chinese ingredients, and scallion oil is the most critical connector and the flavor protagonist hidden behind Chinese cuisine.
No.5 The Great Voyage of Wu Da triggered the largest species exchange in human history. Onions are no exception. In the middle and late Ming Dynasty, Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica mentioned an onion with a strange appearance: "Lou Cong, which is called Longjiao Onion by people in the south of the Yangtze River, is widely planted in Jingchu. Its skin is red, and each stem has branches like octagon, hence the name."
No one knows where the onion came from, but this new variety of Allium, which emerged between the 14th and 16th centuries, quickly spread to Russia, Korea, Japan, and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River in China. It is almost certain that it has an important relationship with the ever-changing navigation technology and frequent maritime trade. Compared with shallots and scallions, the onion does not have any more special taste. But it has a huge species characteristic: it can grow in an extremely low temperature environment of about minus 20 degrees Celsius. For the Mediterranean, where the temperature difference between the four seasons is relatively small, this is not an advantage, but in East Asia, where the monsoon has a significant impact, the promotion and spread of the onion means that many people can eat onions all year round. Coincidentally, it was during this period that the Tibetan regime, which had been fighting against the Central Plains dynasty for hundreds of years, disintegrated and the snowy plateau gradually integrated into the Chinese territory. A large number of cultures, systems and products from the Central Plains entered the Tibetan area, including the extremely cold-resistant allium. For farmers and herdsmen in Tibetan areas, this important spice improves the situation of poverty in the long winter on the plateau. Whether it is a pot of steaming, oily yak beef hot pot with some chopped green onions, or a bowl of ordinary Tibetan noodles with a spoonful of scallion oil fried in rapeseed oil: the arrival of scallions has added infinite color to life in Tibetan areas.
On the other hand, the onion can also be grown in the hot, rainy and fertile areas of southern China, and has evolved into a more developed and fragrant variety: the onion. Some people eat its swollen red base and named it "red onion". It looks like a small onion, but looks like garlic when peeled.
The most important step in making the braised pork rice and stewed pork rice, the snacks that Taiwan is proud of today, is to fry chopped shallots in lard until they turn golden yellow before seasoning. Fragrant! Of course, Lou Onion is not the end of this dissemination and promotion. In his travel notes, Marco Polo recorded a kind of onion with purple spikes of flowers that was common in northern China during the Yuan and Ming dynasties, the "Ezo Onion". Ezo is the old name of Hokkaido in Chinese. Judging from the name, this onion is also an imported product of maritime trade. By the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Ezo Onion had spread to Western Europe and landed in America with the fleet that conquered the New World. The chives (four-season onion) that Zhang Ailing met on the street was the name given to the Ezo Onion by Americans to adapt to local customs. But in China, people call it "Northern Onion". As the name suggests, it mainly grows in the north.
Today, Chinese people use it to make dumplings. Adding a little scallion oil mixed with northern scallions and rapeseed oil to the pork and cabbage filling can make the filling tender and moist. Or it can be used to stew lamb, and the northern scallions and roots are stewed with fat and tender lamb chops together. Sprinkle a handful of green onions before serving for a fresh and delicious taste. Grilled fish with northern scallions is also a specialty. Wash and lay the long scallion segments on the bottom of the dish. The whole sea bass is brushed with peanut oil and grilled. When it comes out of the oven, the scallions taste better than the fish. No.6 In 1713, Emperor Kangxi celebrated his 60th birthday and hosted a banquet to receive the Mongolian king, Bogudazab, and his wife. The "Records of the Qing Dynasty" recorded the contents of this meal, which included a dish called "Sesame Oil and Shallot Chicken". Although it was just a simple scrambled egg with shallots, this should be the first time that shallots were served at a state banquet.
Photo/Cai Cai Food Diary The real scientific name of Allium mongolicum is Allium mongolianum. Although it is called allium, its taste and aroma are closer to onions. The herders in the Mongolian Plateau and Gobi Desert have long had the habit of eating this plant. Allium mongolicum dumplings, allium mongolicum pancakes, allium mongolicum scrambled eggs, and allium mongolicum salads only require a little bit of mutton fat or rapeseed oil to stimulate the aroma of allium mongolicum and make it more crisp and tender.
Chinese civilization, which is based on farming, has long regarded sand onions as crude and unpresentable food for nomadic tribes or feed for cattle and sheep. No scholar or literati has ever praised its deliciousness. But in the Kangxi era, it was actually included in official history as part of a formal banquet. This is related to the fact that the Mongols, Yuan Dynasty, and Qing Dynasty successively ruled the Central Plains, bringing a large number of northern ethnic groups with them. It is also related to the improvement of transportation infrastructure and technological progress, which has led to a wider range of people's diets and fewer barriers to regional diets.
During the reign of Emperor Kangxi, in a book of literati notes describing the customs of Guangdong, Lingnan Miscellaneous Notes, there appeared such a record: "Onions are shaped like a single garlic, but without the flesh. When peeled, they are like scallions. The white ghosts in Macau serve the guests with shreds and fill their plates with them. They taste extremely sweet and spicy." This may be the first time that onions appeared in Chinese literature. A few years later, in the Records of the Hui People in Xinjiang, there appeared such content: "Piyasi, leaves are like leeks, roots are like garlic but without petals, and the stems are more than an inch long. The taste is between scallions and garlic. There are two types, red skin and white skin. Hui people like it the most." "Piyas" is the pronunciation of "onion" in Uyghur, but what is described here is obviously not shallots or scallions, but a new foreigner, onions. Today, "Piyasi" has become the name for onions for all Xinjiang people.
No one can verify whether onions first entered China with the fleet of colonists along the coast of Guangdong, or as a product from the Western Regions after the Qing-Zungar War. But obviously, the Chinese named it quite accurately. Although its young shoots do not have the flavor of traditional "scallions", it is obvious that its fat bulbs are the core of the onion flavor. Although the root is eaten, it is still a kind of onion in essence. Compared with the foreigners who eat onions raw: "cut into shreds and fill the plate with jade", the Chinese have equipped this exotic onion with more ways of eating, and also made it more connected with "oil".
Cantonese cuisine likes stir-frying with scallions and ginger, such as stir-frying crab with scallions and chicken with scallions. The accurate description is to sauté galangal and onions in hot oil. Ordinary chicken nuggets and crab claws are transformed after being soaked in onions and oil.
Shandong cuisine is good at stir-frying with high heat. Onions and green and red peppers are cut into diamond-shaped slices and fried together with pork tripe. The pork tripe is tender and the onions are crispy and sweet. Whether it is home-cooked or a restaurant banquet, this is an indispensable dish.
People in Jiangsu and Zhejiang love to eat pig intestines stew. Rock sugar, dark soy sauce, dried chili and pig intestines are slowly stewed in a clay pot. When the fat overflows and the soup is half dry, add a handful of soul-stirring onions. The clay pot has good heat storage, and the onions sizzle in the fat for a while, filling the room with a strange fragrance.
Fried pork liver is a must-have in Jianghu cuisine in Sichuan and Hunan. Whether it is Sichuan-style stir-fried pork liver or Hunan-style bandit pork liver, onion is the most indispensable ingredient in this dish. The slightly sweet taste moisturizes the spicy pork liver, and the fat in the pork liver makes the onion more crispy.
Photo/Cai Cai Food Diary Although onions have only been introduced to China for 300 years at most, it is obvious that onions have been completely integrated into the scallion oil world of the Chinese and are inseparable from it.
In the 1930s, another kind of onion came to China: leek. This magical plant, which looks like garlic sprouts, is called leek, but tastes like leek, has a long history of consumption in Europe. The white and green flag of Wales even comes from leek.
Some people think leeks look like garlic sprouts, so they use them to stir-fry pork, but the dish lacks fragrance. In fact, the aroma of leeks is extremely restrained and needs to be treated delicately. The traditional Western method is to mix them with peanut oil and dough to make leek pancakes; or to use them in the process of frying steak to stimulate the aroma with butter. Macau is the first place in China to use leeks on a large scale, from African chicken cooked with peanut oil, leeks, coconut shreds, chili peppers, and tomato sauce; to Portuguese sauce boiled with curry, coconut milk, butter, and leeks; to shrimp soup stewed with fresh shrimp, salty shrimp paste, olive oil, rice noodles, and leeks. These Portuguese delicacies that are not available in Portugal have taken root, sprouted, blossomed and borne fruit in China.
Leeks, the authentic European onion, met peanut oil from Sichuan, lard from Guangdong, and olive oil from Guangxi after arriving in China, and became a part of Chinese-style Western cuisine in a unique way. Together with scallions, shallots, chives, scallions, scallions, northern onions, sand onions, and onions, they gradually built up the all-encompassing scallion oil map of Chinese flavors, and also witnessed the brilliance and romance of the Chinese people on the increasingly smaller earth.
| Guangdong · Scallion Chicken|
| Fujian · Scallion Oil Sturgeon Rice| | Guizhou · Red Oil Jelly | | Zhejiang · Scallion Tofu | | Sichuan Boiled Pork Slices| | Jiangsu·Spicy Fried Eel| | Shanghai Scallion Pancake| | Hubei · Scallion Fish| | Gansu · Scallion Oil Guokui|
| Shaanxi Oil-Splashed Pulled Noodles| -END-
In 1996, the year after Eileen Chang passed away, Hong Kong director Ms. Ann Hui came to Shanghai to film Eileen Chang's posthumous work "Eighteen Springs". Ann Hui said: When she was in Shanghai, she liked to go to the old Shikumen alleys in Luwan and order a bowl of scallion oil noodles with a long chopstick inserted diagonally, and a fried golden poached egg. The scallion oil is made from lard and shallots, and is fragrant; the noodles are alkaline noodles, thin and round, and the core is half-cooked; the soy sauce should be the dark soy sauce from Ningbang Soy Sauce Factory, which is rich in color and fresh in taste; the poached egg should be put into the pan with boiling oil, the egg white should be puffy and crispy, and the egg yolk should still be runny.
Such a standard Shanghai breakfast can make people spend day after day in a leisurely and peaceful way, and unconsciously become a part of the play. Later, the novel "Eighteen Springs" became the movie "Half Life"; later, Luwan District was merged into Huangpu District, and the old neighborhoods and old business formats in Shikumen have disappeared for many years. An ordinary bowl of scallion oil noodles has gradually become a precious taste in memory.
Desire and ability are often a pair of contradictory formulas in life. Only when you reach a certain age will you understand that flowers have their seasons and people will grow old; only then will you realize that a table full of colorful abalone, shark's fin and bird's nest is not as good as a simple and generous spoonful of scallion oil. |
