On the Diet Culture of Beijingers —— Seeking food and exploring taste (II)

To say that Beijingers eat well, many foreigners are unconvinced, and many southerners can't stand the rudeness of northerners. To say that Beijingers love to eat, they are quite confident as Beijingers. Of course, there are still many areas with this cultural gene, such as Sichuan and Chongqing. Eating is a kind of culture and entertainment in Beijing's life. What you eat is not necessarily important, but who you eat with. It is definitely a kind of enjoyment of life and a good relaxation to have a chat with friends or friends.

Hair porcelain and friends are separated for different reasons. Maoci refers to childhood playmates, maybe neighbors in the alley, maybe classmates in primary school or middle school. This kind of friend, who grew up together, is simple and doesn't have much interest pollution. There is also a kind of friend who contacted after entering the university and going to the society. Such friends can also be called good friends. Of course, there are interests, values and congenial temperament, but we are happy together anyway. The reason why we want to divide it so finely is because what different people eat and how to eat it are still very different.

In my generation, when I was young, if a few friends said where to play today, they would just eat there, chatting and bragging while eating. This kind of eating is a kind of entertainment for us. Even if you watch a movie or karaoke, it is perfect to add a meal. What I eat with Xiaoci is more old Beijing snacks, flies restaurants, childhood flavors, and the most homely and intimate restaurants. Ordering is not expensive, just like yourself. Choosing a restaurant doesn't care about the grade, but must care about the taste. The taste doesn't care about being tall, but it must have the taste of home and the taste of old Beijing. If you have dinner with friends, it will be different. After all, you have to take care of the tastes and preferences of the north and the south, so you will have a wider choice, taking into account everyone's tastes. But a real good friend is definitely not going to a fancy hotel, but to a small restaurant with characteristics and taste. In fact, we can also see the depth and intimacy of friendship from each other's meals.

It is said that old Beijing pays attention to eating, but southerners certainly disagree. It is true that Beijing's diet is rough. The food culture of every place is inseparable from geography, history and humanities. Although Beijing is the ancient capital of several dynasties, these dynasties were either founded by peasant uprisings or by nomadic people in the north. Humanely speaking, there is no foundation and conditions for a good food culture. Geographically speaking, as the northern inland, there was basically no seafood to eat in the past. If you want to eat, you can only eat dried seafood, and the taste is naturally not good. In the cold places in the north, before the popularization of greenhouses, there are basically no fresh vegetables to eat in winter, so there will be a lot of pickles, pickles and winter storage vegetables. In order to preserve them, they are naturally heavy and single in taste. Before the emergence of modern logistics, cold storage and planting technology, the ingredients that old Beijing could eat were still very limited, such as the most famous old Beijing instant-boiled mutton. In fact, rinse vegetables are mutton slices, frozen tofu, cabbage and vermicelli, which are eaten with sesame cakes. There are many kinds of ingredients, which can't be compared with Sichuan hot pot.

Although the ingredients are limited, because of the pampered cultural atmosphere of the Eight Banners' children, they also have their own "exquisite" food under the limited ingredients. All kinds of time-honored brands are the embodiment of paying attention to food, and what food you eat has its own famous brand name. For example, roast duck in cheap square, pickles in Liubiju, steamed dumplings in the old place, bean bags in Liuquanju and so on.

Eating in Beijing is also divided into two lines: court and folk snacks. During the Manchu Dynasty, the inner city, later the East and West City, was inhabited by rich and powerful people, while the southern city, later Xuanwu and Chongwen, was inhabited by poor people. Therefore, most authentic old Beijing snacks are concentrated in the southern border, especially Qianmen Street, which runs through the north and south and connects the inner and outer cities. In the inner city, there are many big restaurants and few snacks. Most poor people make a living by selling coolies, so most of the snacks in old Beijing are all kinds of cheap leftovers, but their tastes are greasy and heavy. The poor eat cheaply, which is both satisfying and satisfying. For example, you can see the historical traces of poor people's food in stew, fried liver, bean juice, fried enema and mutton offal. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, the Qing court collapsed, and its court dishes, ethnic dishes and snacks began to spread to the people with the spread of chefs. Such as chestnut noodles, Shaqima, pea yellow, almond tofu and so on. This kind of snacks pay more attention to raw materials and production technology. Today, however, these are all integrated with each other and become a unified "old Beijing snack".

As the capital of several dynasties, Beijing's diet is monotonous and rough due to limited conditions, but it is also tolerant and integrated. The local flavors converge, and then they are improved according to the local ingredients, tastes and climate in Beijing. In fact, the style of Beijing cuisine is not obvious. Beijing is more about home cooking and snacks, and there are no distinctive cuisines or banquets. If we insist on Beijing cuisine, in fact, many of them have evolved from Shandong cuisine, but they have been improved according to Beijing's taste and regional conditions. It is also the characteristic of modern Beijing cuisine to tolerate local flavors and learn from others.

Since eating is a kind of entertainment, in fact, paying attention to eating is not the first priority, and the atmosphere of eating is more important. The popular food stall culture in the past few years is quite in line with Beijing people's demand for eating as entertainment. A few good friends find an open-air fly restaurant, several dishes of home-cooked cold dishes with mutton kebabs, beer and Erguotou, all of which are simple public ingredients, but drinking and bragging together can make you feel more worried, less stressed and more mellow.

People in Beijing don't pay attention to clothes. Standard Beijingers wear big vests, shorts and sandals and slippers in summer. Suits and ties are either insurance sellers or real estate agents. Dressing is not because of poverty, but because it is not important. You see, many old Beijingers wear ordinary clothes, but many of them are relocated households and big bosses. It is not unusual to have tens of billions of dollars. On the contrary, most of them are nouveau riche or new Beijingers, and those who wear famous brands really can't pee with old Beijingers. It is precisely because of this temperament that Beijingers don't pay attention to ostentation and extravagance when eating. Grand hotels and restaurants are just for work. It's really a fraternity party. Definitely a small place, a small restaurant.

Beijingers don't pay much attention to playing (which is also a legacy of the Eight Banners, and there are also differences in indigenous culture in old Beijing in Wanaji), but they pay great attention to eating. This way of eating is not expensive and good, but right, beautiful and comfortable. Is to eat as a means of entertainment, a medium to cultivate feelings. Of course, with the changes of society, cultures are also different, and the connotation of old Beijing food culture is also changing, but there are still feelings and memories in the bones, which will not disappear in the short term.