Daily conversation about delivering dried vegetables

In our family, I don't remember eating prune barbecue for decades. My ancestral home is Yuyao, Zhejiang, and Yuyao belongs to Ningbo, so it is called Ningbo in Shanghai. Dried plum meat is a traditional dish in Zhejiang, but for some reason, it has been included in Cantonese cuisine.

My relatives in Yuyao have always had the habit of cooking dried plums themselves. Although I haven't seen the whole process of pickling plums with my own eyes, I know that cooking plums is quite time-consuming and laborious. Every year, relatives personally send their own prunes to Shanghai and distribute them to their relatives for tasting. Every year, I receive two big bags of dried plums, one for myself, and the other bag is divided into several small bags every year and then given to friends who are waiting for early adopters.

Due to the special processing technology of dried plums, the finished products will emit a particularly strong dried plum fragrance. If you don't tie the pocket of the plum, the taste of the plum will come out of the pocket and pervade the whole room.

Because of this geographical connection, our family's housekeeping dishes must be dried plums and barbecue. When I was a child, I liked to eat prunes and barbecue cooked by my mother. At that time, there was a shortage of materials and no understanding of food. As long as I can eat meat, I am happy. I remember eating prune stew. After my mother died, I continued to eat this housekeeping dish cooked by my father. My father didn't inherit his mother's cooking skills. I remember that he didn't like stewed plums, but he liked steamed plums, saying that eating plums like this was chewy. Looking back on my father's version now, in fact, his cooking is not home.

Later, I took over, continued to innovate, and carried forward the dish of dried plum meat at home. Now the technology of dried plum vegetables cooked by relatives in Yuyao has also kept pace with the times. Modern people advocate eating healthy food, so the salt content of dried plums is much lower now, and dried bamboo shoots are added, which is more nutritious and tastes better. Seeing this improved dried plum dish, I also came up with the idea of improving the barbecue technology of dried plum dishes and living up to such good ingredients.

Born to like innovation, I didn't know when I became a foodie and became a part-time home cook without professional qualification certificate. So the plate of dried plum meat at home has been tossed out in many versions.

In the past, I always thought that there was too little roast meat in dried plums, so I first came up with a version of meat, that is, the ratio of meat to dried plums was 7: 3, and I mainly ate meat and enjoyed it myself. Later, I heard that I wanted to eat less meat, so I made a version with less meat, that is, the ratio of meat to dried plums was 3: 7, with dried plums as the main food and meat as the foil.

I feel that I am about fifty years old, and my cooking is excellent, and my food is becoming more and more exquisite. At this time, I am not limited to this dish, but thinking about how to make this dish on the table. So there appeared a hotel version of dried plum with pork belly. Pork belly must be bought with black pigs, and the meat cutter was required to cut the pork belly into the same size. Soak dried prunes in soft water and chop them into powder. This restaurant version of dried plums is stewed with meat. Dried plums are wrapped in pork belly, and the meat is fragrant, and the vegetables are soaked in meat, ruddy and shiny. It is an excellent companion for drinking and eating.

Later, I made a family dinner version of steamed meat with dried plums. In order to meet the food standards in color, fragrance and shape, bacon was used instead of pork belly, and the bacon was neatly spread on dried plums and steamed for more than an hour. This steamed pork with plums is suitable for entertaining guests. It is beautifully set, delicious and attractive, and people who don't like meat will have an appetite.

The way of eating steamed meat with dried plum vegetables in recent years has opened my eyes. For example, the leftover dried plum steamed meat is used for fried rice the next day. This fried rice with dried plums without any seasoning has become an original food in our family. If you find that you have a bad appetite, have a bowl of fried rice with dried plums. I also used the leftover steamed pork with dried plums to make steamed buns, which turned into steamed buns with dried plums. It must be much more delicious than what I bought at the steamed bun shop outside. The soup penetrated into the inner wall of the steamed stuffed bun, and the meat was crisp and rotten, so I couldn't stop biting it.

Recently, I remembered that my father's steamed pork with dried plums was not authentic, and decided to improve the cooking method. First, soak dried plums in clear water for half an hour, and squeeze out soy sauce color water for later use; Blanch pork belly, put a little peanut oil in the pot, add ginger slices, star anise and fragrant leaves, and then take them out; Add rock sugar and burn it to caramel color, and add pork belly instead of soy sauce for coloring; Add cooking wine and light soy sauce, then stir-fry dried plums for a while. Take a deep pot, spread a layer of dried prunes and a layer of pork belly, and finally steam it in a cage for more than an hour.

The 20 18 version of steamed pork with dried plum vegetables is characterized by using rock sugar instead of soy sauce to color, which reduces the salty taste, and it is healthier and brighter after cooking with rock sugar instead of white sugar. Dried plums and streaky pork are laid in layers, and the oily juice will drip into dried plums to absorb the meat flavor, while streaky pork is fat but not greasy, and dried plums are oily but not firewood. Ingredients complement each other and complement each other. The taste has reached an unprecedented height.

Every family will have one or two housekeeping dishes, and each housekeeping dish will inherit some memories or stories. If one day your family asks you to eat a housekeeping dish that you haven't cooked for a long time, it must be a moment to wake up the taste in her memory, and that feeling must be beautiful.