Shanxi: A Land of Wheaten Food
AS a saying goes, “The world’s best wheaten foods are in China, and Shanxi is known for a wide variety of options.” Shanxi Province boasts an extensive and profound culture of making various delicious wheaten foods. Accordingly it has been treated as the land of wheaten foods since ancient times.
Wheat is the main grain eaten as a staple food in northern China. According to historical records, the cultivation of wheat in China can be traced back to over 5,000 years ago, when the Chinese civilization was nascent. At that time, wheat was grown in the middle reaches of the Yellow River, and then gradually extended to the Yangtze River basin due to good yields of the crop. Located in the middle reaches around the Yellow River, Shanxi has the ideal geographical location and climatic conditions for growing wheat. It is one of the earliest and largest centers of agricultural origins in the world and the birthplace of a rich wheaten food culture.
In Shanxi, a housewife has access to various kinds of ingredients, including wheat, sorghum, bean, and buckwheat flour, and are adept at making them into dozens of dishes. In the skilled hands of a chef, a clump of dough can be made into over 100 types of food. Roughly Shanxi wheaten foods have three cooking styles: steamed, boiled, and fried, boasting more than 280 varieties. The steamed foods include corn breads, steamed buns, flower buns, and steamed pork dumplings. The boiled foods include knife-peeled noodles, hand-pulled noodles, and hand-plucked noodles. The fried foods include fried cakes, pancakes, and fried dough twists. Among them, the knife-peeled noodle dish is best-known and most popular both at home and abroad.
Shanxi people love eating noodles, and have many techniques for preparing a variety of noodles. Sometimes, they seem obsessed with the craftsmanship of making different styles and shapes of wheaten food. The knife-peeled noodle dish is among the most favorite of local people. The name also implies the way the dish is prepared. A skillful chef holds dough in one hand, and cuts it into strips with a special knife in the other hand, which then are directly dumped into a pot of boiling water. The whole process resembles a thrilling kung fu performance, where as one slice of noodle falls into the boiling water, the other is flying in the air, and the third has just been peeled off. Within only a minute, the chef standing in front of the pot can cut out 200 slices of noodles. The noodles have a shape of a willow leaf, with medium thickness and thin edges. The noodles in the cooked noodle dish are smooth and tender, and have a chewy texture, and taste delicious. It joins Beijing’s fried sauce noodles, Shandong’s Yifu noodles, Hubei’s hot dry noodles, and Sichuan’s noodles in chili sauce to be regarded as China’s five most famous noodle dishes.
Jiupian, or the hand-plucked noodles, as the name suggests, is pulled down directly by hand from a clump of dough. It is a common home-cooked dish in Shanxi. The dough is kneaded, flattened, and pulled into small button-sized thick pieces with a concave in the center, and then thrown into the boiling pot. When the strips float to the surface, they are ready to be dished out. This particularly firm and chewy style of noodle is a favorite dish of locals.
Shanxi people have a special feeling when eating wheaten foods. On their birthdays, a bowl of noodles means longevity; at the Spring Festival, noodles are eaten for a prosperous new year; at weddings or funerals, gift buns in various shapes and colors represent the maker’s good wish for the newlyweds or the deceased, respectively. Wheaten foods in Shanxi are not made just to satisfy a hungry stomach, but a way to express Chinese people’s emotions and their philosophy of life.