An explanation of the traditional process of making zongzi.

"On May 5, the wheat was cooked and dumplings were wrapped for the Dragon Boat Festival." On the Dragon Boat Festival, the indispensable traditional activities are: eating zongzi to commemorate Qu Yuan, racing dragon boats, hanging calamus and mugwort leaves, smoking Atractylodes rhizome and angelica dahurica, and drinking realgar wine.

Many friends at work usually hand out zongzi on the Dragon Boat Festival. There are all kinds of fillings in a bag, so it is very convenient to take it out and heat it. However, there are also many friends who like to package jiaozi by themselves. Take me for example. Compared with other miscellaneous fillings, my family prefers traditional jujube dumplings. The dumplings issued by the company are still old, but there are only two small red dates in the red date dumplings, which is not good enough for taste and taste. Therefore, my family will make jujube dumplings almost every year, and put 3 or 4 dates in each dumpling, which makes me feel better.

The shape of zongzi is inherited from ancient times. The ancient zongzi was called "Jiao Su", and the horns were horns, which were sacrificial vessels. Xiaomi is glutinous rice. On the Dragon Boat Festival, people put glutinous rice in corners to make triangular "corn millet". Because Qu Yuan threw himself into the river, it is said that in order to save him, ordinary people threw rice dumplings with horns into the river to feed the fish, which could block the fish's mouth. So zongzi is made into an angular shape.

Today, I'm going to introduce the traditional wrapping method of four-corner glutinous rice balls, which I summarized as "1 circle 2, 3 covers and 40% off". Like a friend might as well give it a try:

Ingredients: glutinous rice 1 kg, 40 pieces of zongye, and 4 pieces of red dates.

Production method:

1: After washing glutinous rice twice with clear water, soak it in clear water for one night in advance; Soak the dried zongzi leaves in light salt water for 2-3 hours, then brush the leaves with a brush, and then cut off the dry leaves and hard petioles at the head and tail; Wash the red dates for later use.

2: "1circle: circle into a cone" Take two zongzi leaves, arrange them face up, pinch both ends with your hands and circle into a cone. It is best to fold a small crease at the tip of the cone to avoid rice wrapping and rice leakage during cooking. [Note that this cone is just the size of a zongzi, not too big. ]

3: "2 put: put stuffing" pinch the junction of four leaves with your left hand, put a little glutinous rice in your right hand, put 3 or 4 red dates, and finally cover with glutinous rice and compact with a spoon.

4: "3 Cover" holds the cone with the left hand, and pinches the front end with the thumb and forefinger to form a triangle. At this time, the right hand grips the two corners of the zongzi with the thumb and forefinger, breaks off the leaves on it, and covers it on the sticky rice tightly.

5: "Four fold two" when the extra leaves on the top are folded down, the thumb and forefinger of the left hand are released separately, so that the upper leaves can press the lower leaves. First flatten the two sides and fold them straight, then fold the extra leaves to the right (or left). At the same time, the thumb of the left hand helps to fix them and make the triangle firm.

6. finally tie it with a rope. If you can't use your hands, you can use your teeth to help you bite tight ~

7: Put the wrapped zongzi into the steamer, then pour the clean water that has not touched the zongzi, cover the colander, and turn to low heat for 2 hours after boiling.

8: Let the zongzi soak for 2-3 hours after turning off the fire, and it will be sweeter and softer when taken out ~

1: The glutinous rice must be soaked in advance, and it is best to soak it for one night to make the glutinous rice grains swell, so that the cooked zongzi tastes more sticky and fragrant.

2. When using dried zongzi leaves, some friends like to boil them in hot water before using them. I think cooking with hot water will lose the fragrance of many zongzi leaves. I usually operate like this:

1) Soak the dried zongzi leaves in light salt water for 2-3 hours to make the dried zongzi leaves green and saturated with water. In this way, the leaves of zongzi will be tougher and not easy to break.

2) Then brush the dust and dirt on the leaves of Zongzi repeatedly, and you can use it.

3) If there are many people in the family and there are a lot of jiaozi, you should pay attention to putting the leaves in the water and using them while holding them to keep them moist and dry.

3: Is cooking zongzi cold water or hot water?

A friend said that you should boil the water before cooking zongzi, just like cooking jiaozi. However, such zongzi is easy to be cooked externally and endogenous, or loose and exposed. The correct way is to put cold water into the pot so that the zongzi and water are heated evenly, so that the cooked zongzi is not raw at all and tastes more sticky and fragrant.

4: How can I stay if I can't eat zongzi?

1) Zongzi is difficult to cook, so it's better to cook it before putting it in the refrigerator.

2) Before the cooked zongzi is put into the refrigerator, it should be thoroughly cooled and drained (otherwise it will easily deteriorate and mildew), and then it should be put into a fresh-keeping bag for 3-4 days or frozen for half a month.

3) The zongzi taken out of the refrigerator must be thoroughly heated before eating, so as not to spoil your stomach.

At present, most common zongzi on the market are quadrangular triangles. However, there are also pillow-shaped ones, such as the four corners of Huzhou, horseshoes of Sichuan, horns of Guangdong and long queues of Suichang. No matter what their shapes are, their tastes are familiar to us.

Although I can buy zongzi whenever I want to eat now, I always think it is more appropriate to eat it with my family during the Dragon Boat Festival, and it tastes sweeter ~ I wonder if your family has made zongzi this year?