People in Chongqing eat hot pot as early as the Qing Dynasty (1821-1850). At that time, there was a cooker in the street of Yang Ren, cooking a pot of salt soup in a big iron pot. There are 9 pieces of bamboo and wood in it for 9 people to eat at the same table. In order to avoid fishy smell, spicy seasoning was added, which became the embryonic form of today's hot pot.
Maodu hot pot was first sold on the street, and most of the food was Lifu who carried the boat and the tracker who pulled the boat. 1934, hot pot shop from the street. According to people in the catering industry, the first hot pot restaurant in Chongqing opened in Linjiangmen [Gallery] Street. At that time, there were many banks and banks in that area. After the hot pot entered the store, besides Lifu, there were many bank employees.
Li Jie, a Sichuan writer, was the first to introduce Chongqing hot pot systematically. He wrote in Shi Feng magazine 1947: "Eating buffalo beef omasum hotpot originated in Jiangbei, Chongqing. At first, ordinary retail investors bought buffalo offal, washed it and cooked it, then cut the liver and stomach into small pieces, put a mud stove on the bear's head, and put a framed tin basin on it. A spicy and salty marinade was poured into the basin, so the ordinary salespeople on the riverside bridge benefited a lot. It was not until 23 years of the Republic of China that a small restaurant in Chongqing made it noble, and the earthen stove was still there. It's just that the iron pot has been replaced by a small copper pot, and the marinade and dipping sauce have also been replaced by clean ones suitable for Chongqing people's tastes.
When the Anti-Japanese War broke out, a large number of people from Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai poured into the mountain city, and hot pot began to flourish. Linjiang Road, Chuandaoguai and Shangqing Temple are all full of customers. There are unique reasons for the prosperity of hot pot in Chongqing. An expert who studies hot pot believes that there are three reasons: First, Chongqing is located at the bottom of the Sichuan Basin, foggy and humid, and the sunshine is scarce. Adding spicy things such as pepper, pepper and ginger to the diet can drive away cold and dampness; The second is the hot pot that Chongqing people will eat, and it is delicious, spicy and delicious, and the taste is rich and colorful; Third, Chongqing people are generous, drinking in a big bowl and eating meat in a big bowl. Knowing how to raise chopsticks and punch around the stove can better show the generous character of mountain people.
Chongqing people can eat, which has been fully demonstrated in the development of hot pot. Traditional hot pot, mainly beef tripe and other offal, has undergone fundamental changes in the hands of modern Chongqing. Shrimp, crab, sea cucumber, squid, rice cake, glutinous rice flour, yellow flowers, wood factory ears, various dry non-staple foods and fresh vegetables all joined the team. In terms of taste, there are spicy, litchi and sweet, and clear soup hot pot has also developed, including chicken soup, fish soup and sparerib soup. Even the fuel for hot pot has a modern flavor. Kerosene stoves, alcohol stoves, natural gas stoves, liquefied gas stoves and solid fuel hot pot have replaced mud stoves and earth stoves. Since the hot pot was placed in an elegant hall from the street, with the development of economy and the improvement of people's life, comfortable high-backed seats replaced long benches, and stainless steel tableware "drove away" the widespread use of modern main products such as earthen bowls, earthen bowls, air conditioners and range hoods. Let the native Chongqing hot pot bring a little foreign flavor.
Spicy, spicy, spicy and delicious hot pot, although a native mountain city, rushed out of Chongqing, Sichuan basin and the world with its excellent color, fragrance and taste. Now it's floating around.
Third, the foggy city:
Chongqing is foggy, known as the "foggy city of Chongqing", and it was also known as the "foggy city" during the Anti-Japanese War. During the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression period, a large number of Japanese planes carried out a long-term strategic bombing of Chongqing's wartime capital, and all activities in the city came to a standstill. People are looking forward to the arrival of fog season. Every year 10 to April of the following year is the foggy season in Chongqing. In the fog season, the fog enveloped the mountain city, forming a natural air defense network, and Japanese planes could not air strike. In the foggy season, all walks of life in the city are active again, people no longer stay in bomb shelters, and Chongqing city is back to life. The cultural circles in the capital take advantage of the foggy season to show movies and plays in major theaters in turn, which is called "Fog Plum Show". When the fog season was released, it was unprecedented. The playwright Song Zhi's "Chongqing in Fog" is one of the most popular plays on the stage of fog season drama.
Chongqing is foggy because of its geographical environment. The mountain city of Chongqing is located on the edge of the East Sichuan Basin, surrounded by mountains and the two rivers meet. The evaporation of river water is not easy to spread, and the humid air is saturated and easy to condense into fog. The number of foggy days in Chongqing is not only the highest in China, but also a world-famous international foggy city. The average annual foggy days in Chongqing are 104 days, while London, which is known as the foggy capital of the world, has only 94 days, and Tokyo, Japan, which is the foggy capital of the Far East, has only 55 days. Chongqing is a veritable "foggy city". Wu Yun, Bishan County, Chongqing has 204 foggy days all the year round, which is called "the best in the world".
In the foggy days of the foggy season in the mountain city, the peninsula is shrouded in dense fog, covering the sky and the sun. Ships in the two rivers stopped sailing and the ferry was closed. City traffic turns on the lights during the day, and traffic accidents increase greatly. When people walk in fog, the visibility ahead is only 10 meter. Fog brings inconvenience to people's lives in the mountain city, but it also adds a charming fog scene to the mountain city. On foggy days, the mountain city is filled with dense fog. "The city in the fog, the city in the fog, the sea of fog, the people in the sea of fog. The foggy scenery of "Fog City" has a unique flavor, which was once called "the unique landscape of Chongqing in Fog City" by poets. Visitors who have just come to Chongqing for sightseeing can enjoy the foggy scenery of the "foggy city of Chongqing" if they encounter foggy days.
Only when you are there, can you appreciate its charm and hazy beauty. However, due to the comprehensive control of environmental pollution, Chongqing's atmosphere has been relatively clean and foggy days are getting less and less.
Fourth, the teahouse culture:
Tea-drinking custom is an important feature of ancient Chongqing culture. It has a long history and is unique in the way of drinking tea and the taste of teahouses, which attracts the interest of Chinese and foreign tourists and embodies the ancient cultural tradition and charming charm of Chongqing. A writer who lived in Chongqing during the Anti-Japanese War, when recalling his wartime life in Chongqing, said in an article published in Sing Tao Tourism magazine in Hong Kong, "The taste of Paris is in cafes, and the taste of Chongqing is in teahouses. If you write about Chongqing, you have to write about teahouses. Make tea in a bowl, soak in a bowl, have three friends and four friends, and lie on a bamboo chair and talk as long as you want. " It shows that Chongqing Teahouse has a strong Bayu flavor, which is appreciated by tourists at home and abroad.
The custom of drinking tea in Chongqing has a long history. According to expert research, as early as the book Tea Classic written by Lu Yu, a tea expert in the Tang Dynasty, he wrote; "Tea drinker, Jia Mu is in the south ... there are two people embracing each other in Bashan Gorge." Bao Wang, a scholar of the Western Han Dynasty, recorded the scene of Ba people making tea and entertaining guests in his book Falling in Love: "If there are guests at home, carry a pot to enjoy the cool. There is everything for making tea, and it has been covered. " Among the poems of Jin Dynasty poets, there is a poem "Drinking tea in Sichuan is the best in the world". Since ancient times, there has been a saying in Chongqing that "there are many temples and many teahouses". Teahouses in Chongqing are all over urban and rural areas, streets and alleys. Sitting in a teahouse and drinking tea has become an indispensable habit for local farmers, workers and businessmen, men, women and children. There are many teahouses in Chongqing, as can be seen from the March issue of Xinmin Daily 1947: "There are 2,659 teahouses in the urban area with less than 9 square kilometers of Fiona Fang Peninsula." This shows that Chongqing people like to drink tea.
Sitting in a teahouse is a life custom of Chongqing people. If you don't drink tea at home, you have to go to the teahouse for tea. Tracing back to the source, it is closely related to the geography and climate of Chongqing, in addition to the living customs followed since ancient times. Chongqing's terrain is steep, people climb mountains, and their feet and legs are weak; Especially in the long cool summer and hot climate, I feel sweaty and thirsty, so I naturally want to find a place to rest and quench my thirst. There are often tea rooms at the top of the slope, the height of the stone ladder and the corner for people to rest and quench their thirst. In the past, there was no park in Chongqing (there was a "park" with an area of 1200 square meters before the Republic of China 18 years ago), so the teahouse became a good place for people to relax. The house in Chongqing is narrow, and relatives and friends can't receive it at home. They often get up and say hello. "Let's go to the teahouse for tea." It's both decent and convenient to make friends with tea and to have a heart-to-heart conversation. Make a bowl of tea and talk as long as you want. It costs little and is very convenient. If further analysis is made, the drinking style of Chongqing people is closely related to the habit of "dragon gate array" of Chongqing people. Chongqing people are generous, enthusiastic and humorous. Men, women and children like to chat and talk endlessly. Teahouses are the best places for people to get together and chat. "Playing the Dragon Gate Array" has become a unique synonym for Chongqing people to chat, chat and tell stories. Sitting in the teahouse, holding fragrant teas, unrestrained, majestic, far away, before, after the Emperor Wu, throughout the ages, old cats and mice, all chatting. Here you can hear anecdotes and gossip that you can't hear at home and don't have in the newspaper. It is really a kind of enjoyment that makes people adjust and enrich their spiritual life, which is difficult for people who don't sit in teahouses to understand.
Chongqing Teahouses are different from teahouses and tea gardens in other cities. The high tables and stools in the northern teahouse and the large porcelain teapot and bowl make it difficult for tea drinkers to sit for a long time, and the big pot of tea is not resistant to drinking, especially losing their interest in drinking and tasting tea. In the traditional Chongqing Teahouse, a small coffee table is placed in front of the bamboo lounge chair, so you can sit on your back, not tired after sitting for a long time, and it is convenient to serve tea and put tea. A "bowl-covering" lamp, take your tea slowly and sit as long as you want. The shopkeeper never orders the guests to leave. If you have anything to leave, just put the tea cover on the tea boat and the guild will keep it for you.
Chongqing people pay attention to good water, good tea and good tea set when drinking tea. In the past, water from two rivers was used, and part of it was taken from the beach near Taipingmen River. Shopkeepers use sand tanks to filter, and they play the tea trick of "river water fragrant tea" to attract special tea customers. Chongqing people have always liked Xiaguan Tuocha in Yunnan, which is bright in color, rich in fragrance, resistant to foam and mellow in taste. Strong tea is molded and shaped like Wowotou in the north. It has the effects of relieving summer heat and boredom, promoting fluid production and quenching thirst, and is deeply loved by Chongqing people. As for the tea set, the exquisite and beautiful "Gaiwancha" comes from Bashu. According to legend, it was invented by the daughter of Cui Ning, our emissary from western Sichuan, during the middle years of the founding of Tang Dezong (780-783). The original teacup has no base plate, it is hot and not fixed on the table. Cui Ning's daughter, Jos, designed a small lacquer wooden pallet to support the teacup and named it "saucer". With the saucer, you can fix the teacup on the table without hot hands, which is convenient for everyone. Chongqing people drink tea with exquisite tea sets. The teacup is a fine porcelain gallery in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province. The saucer (tea boat) is made of copper or tin, engraved with patterns, which is itself a handicraft. The tea set, consisting of tea covers, teacups and tea boats, is simple and elegant, forming a unique tea culture, which was later spread to the south and widely circulated in officialdom and folk. Only by covering a bowl of tea can we appreciate the charm of tea culture. When you first open the freshly brewed tea, the thick tea juice sinks to the bottom of the bowl. Use tea cover to adjust the taste of tea. With a slight scratch, the taste will be great, so you don't have to uncover it when drinking. Put a formal seal to prevent the tea smell from overflowing, and put it on the side to cool faster. The half-buckled and half-closed floating leaves will not be crowded, and the tea fragrance will slowly penetrate into the mouth. The golden boat porcelain cup, which slowly covers the bowl and tastes the tea carefully, is elegant and full of interest, and has the unique style and elegance of stealing tea culture.
In many teahouses in old Chongqing, tea drinkers not only drink tea to quench their thirst, but with the prosperity of commerce and the development of cities in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, teahouses have become places for social exchanges and trading activities of all walks of life, all walks of life and all religions. In the early 1930s, trade associations from all walks of life in Chongqing moved into teahouses, and more than one trade association in the whole city 100 had their own teahouses. At that time, the commercial teahouses in Chongqing were very distinctive and the market had not yet been listed. Buyers and sellers make a counter-offer by using code words or putting their fingers in the sleeve cage. I saw the tea drinkers shuttling back and forth. When they talked, they put the tea cover on a boat and got up and left their seats to find the second one. Samples are displayed in the teahouse, and copies (advertisements) are distributed for promotion. Disputes and debts between peers are mostly solved by the director of the association, and the tea money for that day is paid by the loser. At the same time, most teahouses are Tangkou teahouses in feudal guild society (Paoge). There has always been a saying in Chongqing that "I don't want to hold my brother, I don't want to be a museum". The power to hug my brother is everywhere. Many civil disputes fight without going to the police, the public security bureau chief or the court, but in the teahouse, Uncle Shi will preside and say that "tea" is easy, and I can get away with it. I apologized for losing the gambling and paid for the tea. There is also a cultural teahouse where cultural people gather. Cultural teahouses appeared late in all kinds of teahouses in Chongqing, and they were the products of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. The intellectuals who gathered in the mountain city lived in poverty and had difficulty in housing. It is most convenient to make friends and find a quiet teahouse, so cultural teahouses appear on the street to attract cultural people and tea customers. The famous ones are Jiang Yishan Xuan Tea House in Liangzi Ziqing Annual Meeting, Central Tea House in Qixinggang near China Film Studio and Changting Tea House in Central Park. Most of these teahouses are quiet and elegant, and some are hung with celebrity calligraphy and painting. Teahouses in cultural circles take tea as friends, talk about the world and catch up with the past. Some writers write in teahouses, and journalists exchange news in teahouses to catch up with the flood season, which is really a good place for cultural rest. At that time, the "New Life Teahouse" on the right side of Guotai Cinema was the place where the intellectuals in the film and drama circles gathered for tea, the "Shengping Teahouse" in Huixian Bridge was the place where the opera circles and fans gathered, and the "Jiangxuan Teahouse" in the YMCA was the favorite place for the intellectuals. Here, perched on the commanding heights of Linjiang, the shops are spacious and elegant. Sitting in the teahouse in front of Linjiang, overlooking the peaks on the south bank, overlooking the hundred rivers, watching the surging river and white sails under the window, enjoying the unique charm of Chongqing teahouse culture in Linjiang teahouse is memorable. Gu Zhizhong, a famous journalist, wrote in his travel notes: "Chongqing is famous for its Longmen Teahouse ... Chongqing Teahouse provides a colorful cultural window for the outside world to understand Chongqing's customs."
The echo of history is intertwined with modern civilization. Nowadays, Chongqing teahouses are rare in the bustling downtown area, but the back streets and suburban streets in the central area are still everywhere, and tea customers are like clouds. Most factories, enterprises, trade markets and neighborhood committees have teahouses, and the heritage of Cuba-Chongqing tea culture still exists. Different from the past, there are more color TVs and ceiling fans. Teahouses in suburban villages and towns are even more lively and jubilant, with shops and stalls in front of them active, which has become a unique landscape with the development of commodity economy and the active market. In recent years, "Dong Tian Teahouse" has appeared on the roadside. Many air-raid shelters left over from War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and newly-built air-raid shelters combining peacetime and wartime were used to open teahouses. Dong Tian Teahouse is warm in winter and cool in summer. It is cool and pleasant because the wind blows from the empty valley. Tea drinkers have exhausted their summer heat in the cave, and there is another kind of scenery dotted with thieves and customs.
Five, Chongqing eighteen eccentrics:
The room is like building blocks along the mountain roof, the hot pot is lovely, and it is not fast to walk by car;
Air-conditioned cattail fans are sold at the same time, running all over the street with sticks, and ladies like to show their knees;
Lao Tzu, the tortoise, casually took it, didn't eat noodles, and walked in the street with bare arms.
Looking at the street is so pleasant, running a newspaper is like planting cabbage, and betting on children is heroic;
Short boys and tall girls fall in love, play mahjong, treat guests and put rings on the bus;
Treasure is everywhere, people don't take strange names, and funerals are happy events.