Beef jerky you must have eaten. As a small snack to replenish my energy, I often bring a bag with me when hiking, because it is delicious and resistant to hunger. In Sichuan, a beef jerky is produced, as thin as paper, with a bright red color, and the taste is of course Sichuan's favorite spicy flavor, and it is particularly crispy to bite. Although thin, beef jerky is very tough, and when you taste it, the aftertaste is endless. This beef jerky also has a particularly nice name called Lantern Shadow Beef. It is said that it got its name because it was so thin that it could reveal images under the light, just like the shadow puppet shows we usually see.
I remember when I was in junior high school, I ate light shadow beef for the first time. It was brought home by dad on a business trip to Sichuan. I remember that beef jerky was placed in a plastic bag containing convenience foods, and the red pocket had four words written on it, and the word "light shadow" was particularly eye-catching. Dad said that many people praised this beef jerky as delicious, recommended him to buy it back to Beijing to send his family, he was not willing to open it to eat it.
I didn't know the allusion to the light shadow beef at the time, and I thought it was a place name. When you open the package, you can smell the smell of butter, and inside is a large clump of red shredded beef. It may be that there is too much oil, and the fine shredded beef has become transparent, and it is still stained with white sesame seeds, which looks very appetizing. Later, I learned that in addition to the thin slices, there is also a version of shredded beef, in addition to the different process of tableting, the ingredients and methods of the silk and slices are basically the same.
I carefully clipped some out with chopsticks, handed them to my father's mouth, and said, "Daddy eat first." Dad took it, chewed it and said, "It's really delicious, you have to pay attention, this is very spicy." "After saying that, I ran to find water to drink." With Dad's lesson, I first picked up a shredded beef and put it in my mouth, and found that the beef jerky was soaked in red oil and spicy, with tenacity in the crisp, and the aroma of the beef was also sesame. After learning about the production process of the lantern shadow beef, I learned that this strong sesame flavor not only comes from the two sesame seeds on the surface, but also from the sesame oil put in the production process.
After eating a little, I have a basic understanding of the spiciness of the lamp shadow beef, after all, it is a Sichuan specialty, or very spicy. So I simply ate a bite of shredded beef, took a sip of water to buffer my tongue, and then ate another bite. I couldn't stop eating, and after a while of kung fu, a whole bag of syrup of shredded beef was eaten by me. Compared to the jerky I ate before, the shredded beef is more oily, not as "dry" as other beef jerky, and it is very comfortable to chew. The bags of light shadow beef shreds that Dad brought back quickly swept away, and I parted ways with the light shadow beef shreds for more than ten years.
When it comes to the origin of the lamp shadow beef, it is also necessary to start with a young man surnamed Liu. It is said that during the Guangxu period of the Qing Dynasty, this young man was exiled to Daxian County, Sichuan, to make a living by operating spiced beef. But the jerky he made at the beginning was thick and hard, and the meat was not tasteful. But the young man did not give up, he thought of many ways, the beef was cut very thinly, marinated with various spices for a long time, and then baked on the fire, with sesame oil Titian fresh. Beef made with this method is very popular, and beef jerky, which can be seen in the light, has finally become one of the specialties of Sichuan.
It should be said that the "Xiao Liu" who developed the lamp shadow beef in that year can be regarded as a good young man who has succeeded in entrepreneurship today, not only relying on his head and hands to get rich, but also achieving the reputation of the light shadow beef. However, it is said that the lamp shadow beef once went into decline in Sichuan, and the taste was also greatly reduced, which made people a little distressed. Fortunately, in the past two years, the lantern shadow beef made by hand has reappeared in the jianghu. I sincerely hope that more Xiao Liu will appear and make the lantern shadow beef fragrant again.