People take food as the sky, and steamed buns are a must-have for every household in the north. In Changyi, after twelve hours of "growth", the big dumpling has become a delicacy in people's mouths, and it is also a traditional folk ritual remembered by the local people.
Twelve hours of a big feast
On October 6th, walking into the production workshop of Changyi Lechun Old Noodles Dabao Rao Co., Ltd., a smell of wheat greeted us. More than 10 workers are busy in a tense and orderly manner, and the noodle workers carry a basin of noodles to the noodle case, the workers use knives to cut into small pieces, the noodles are very hard, and the cutting surfaces are smooth and flat. The worker in charge of weighing carefully weighs the dough according to the specification of 1 kg/block and then passes it to the cake press. Only to see the cake presser put the dough into the cake press, instantly the dough into the dough, folded and then put in, each piece of dough repeatedly pressed 8-10 times into a cake shape, passed to the steamed bun worker.
Through the steps of stacking, pressing, kneading, kneading, and harvesting, and then embedding the small red dates, the steamed bread is kneaded into a large dumpling with a bottom diameter of 11 cm, a positive shape, and a well-proportioned top and bottom in only 20 seconds. "Kneading dough is an important part of the production, after repeated kneading, steamed and cooked inside the dumplings are multi-layered, layered and layered, and the taste is excellent." Li Fengquan, business manager of Lechun Company, introduced that Changyi Dabao is purely handmade, the molding process is very important, a mature worker needs to train for three years, and they have been doing it for the longest time here for 9 years.
Workers knead strictly according to the standard, so the big dumplings will not "vary from person to person", put 4 per tray, and transport them to the steaming room to wake up. Workers according to the relative humidity of 65%, the core temperature of 45 degrees, according to the box temperature strict control of the wake-up time. During the process of waking up, the staff needs to open the box from time to time to check, wake up well, and then steam.
After the three-step temperature control of first Xiaofa, then Daqi, and then Xiaoqi, after 55 minutes, the workers opened the steaming oven, and the hot air steamed out, and a more concentrated, sweet wheat aroma was refreshing, making people instantly have a sense of hunger, and wanted to take a bite of the freshly out of the pot, white and delicate, round and smooth big food. When the steam is gone, the workers dot the food coloring on the big dumplings with carmine, symbolizing the red of the day.
In another workshop, rows of shelves were neatly arranged with the steamed dumplings of the previous day, and workers were bagging each big dumpling in front of a shelf, and several rows of shelves were covered with white cloth to prevent the big dumplings from "laughing". After bagging, the large dumplings are transported to the packaging workshop for packing and shipping. From the japanese noodles to the packaging, after 24 hours of "growth", a delicious big dumpling can be brought to the table.
Face essence water clear old primer, each step is very delicate
From the noodles to the packing, it seems to be a simple process, but in Li Fengquan, it is very exquisite, "the noodles must be refined, the water must be clear, the introduction must be old, and the kneading must be tough." He said that when it comes to noodles alone, they will control the water temperature, water quantity and water quality according to the real-time changes in temperature, and adjust the proportion of the amount of the old noodle primer to ensure that the noodles and noodles meet the quality requirements.
How old is the right one? Li Fengquan said that they had done 0.5 kg/pc and 0.75 kg/pc, and finally determined 1 kg each around 2004. This specification is not arbitrarily determined, they continue to try, steaming out different specifications of the big food, looking for people from all walks of life, company department managers and above to taste repeatedly, taste in the end how big this food is the best taste. After nearly half a year of pondering, they finally determined that a large dumpling of 1 kilogram, "such a large steamed out is the most delicious." Li Fengquan said.
During the peak sales season, 25,000 pounds were made a day
Now this season is not the peak production season of Changyi Dabao, a day to process more than 2500 kilograms of flour, more than ten workers can be busy, most of them are the eleventh holiday returnee to the city to order. The first two months of the Spring Festival are the busiest days of the year, with at least 12,500 kilograms of noodles a day, and the hundred and ten workers are busy for 10 hours a day, and the production of large dumplings is still in short supply. Mr. Chen of Tianjin ordered 20,000 boxes, a customer in Langfang, Hebei Province, ordered 11,000 boxes, and two express delivery companies set up points in Changyi Hotel, constantly shipping goods outside, "After the tenth day of the first month of the waxing moon, we basically did not accept orders, and we could not be busy at all." Li Fengquan said.
A few years ago, Liu Liqiang, a citizen of Changyi, visited zibo's aunt's house and brought some gifts? In the end, he chose to bring two boxes of large dumplings, and his aunt thought it was too delicious after eating it, the tendons, the layers, and the smell of wheat, so he didn't want to eat other steamed buns. Liu Liqiang said: "This is not good, my aunt only recognizes our Lechun big food, buy several boxes at a time, freeze and eat slowly." "Locals take out, e-commerce platform sales, Changyi Dabao in recent years fame, admiration for more." There was once a Shanghai boss who specifically found a production plant, loaded more than a dozen boxes, and brought them back to his hometown. Li Fengquan asked, "Shanghainese people also eat big food?" The other party said: "I am from Shandong, and in Shanghai I heard that Changyi Dabao is delicious, so I specially came to the factory to buy authentic food." ”
Born from the custom, it changes with the custom
How did Changyi Dabao, a traditional pasta, become a delicacy and become the bite that many Changyi people and northerners especially want to eat?
Born of the custom. Changyi was one of the sources of the Maritime Silk Road in modern times, and the prosperity of the silk trade gave birth to the survival and development of the traditional noodle industry. In the middle and late Qing Dynasty, the northern area of Changyi began to appear specializing in wedding and funeral noodles, then called "Rao Bao Shop", focusing on the production and research and development of traditional pasta, with many tricks and good products, and when the New Year festival or birthday celebrations, the people like to buy food or offerings here. Among these shops, Sun's Le Chun Rao Shop is the most famous. After 1949, Sun Huachen, a descendant of the Sun clan, inherited the traditional skills and opened a rao shop in Liu yan street. Every year, when the Spring Festival comes, every household in Changyi village will steam and steam, which is used to offer and entertain relatives and friends, and when relatives go, they will also install one to show respect.
"Changyi Dabao carries many beautiful pursuits and aspirations of the people, contains profound folk cultural connotations, and is full of rituals in the people's faith activities." Li Fengquan said that dabao is an indispensable gift, tribute and food for the local people's life and folk activities in Changyi.
It changes with the mundane. With the improvement of living standards, people began to miss the old noodles handmade with traditional craftsmanship, Changyi County Government Guest House (the predecessor of Changyi Hotel) seized this opportunity to start excavating, sorting, developing and innovating this traditional noodle, in 1976 added a traditional pasta making project, hired Sun Huachen as a teacher, and taught traditional pasta making skills. In 1995, after the reform of the county guest house system, Sun Huachen was further encouraged and supported to inherit his craftsmanship, and the time-honored brand of Lechun was registered as a well-known trademark in Shandong Province. Li Fengquan began to learn traditional pasta skills with Sun Huachen in 1999, is the fourth generation of inheritors, and has been the business manager since the establishment of Lechun Company in October 2004. In October 2020, Lechun's traditional pasta skills were included in the list of provincial intangible cultural heritage representative projects.
In addition to the old noodles, Lechun traditional noodles also have xi rao, noodle fish, shou peach, flag, steamed buns, lotus rolls, flower bumps and other varieties, sales growth year by year, sales scope expanded year by year, with the product supply is in short supply, Changyi Hotel is planning to build a new standardized workshop and cold storage, on the automation equipment, further expansion of production.