"Bowl cake" occupies a place in the memory of the taste buds of Hokkien people. A bowl of soy milk or a bowl of peanut kernel soup with a bowl of cake is probably the breakfast that every Hokkien person has eaten. In the past, every household would cook bowl cakes;Now in our house Jinjiang, there are old craftsmen who make bowl cakes in many places, such as Lishan Village in Neikeng, Batou Village in Anhai, etc., because there are many people who make bowl cakes, and they are also affectionately called "bowl cake villages" by people. In addition, there are many old craftsmen who make bowl cakes scattered in various villages in Jinjiang, and there is a bowl cake shop in Anhai Lincuo Village that has been passed down for three generations and sold for more than half a century. The "head" of this bowl cake shop is 71-year-old Lin Huapian, who has been making bowl cakes for 39 years.
An ancient taste that has been inherited for 52 years
In the early morning, as long as you walk through No. 52-1, Lincuo Erli, Lincuo Natural Village, Qianpu Village, Anhai Town, Jinjiang, you can smell the sweet smell of bowl cakes. This is the processing point where Lin Huapian makes bowl cakes.
I'm 71 years old and I've been making bowl cakes for 39 years. Lin Huapian said as she placed the porcelain bowls in the basket on the steaming tray, and the small porcelain bowls were neatly lined up on the steaming tray one after another, showing a simple beauty. "There are usually 67 or 66 plates on this plate, and there are about 100 plates a day. Lin Huapian said that they make six or seven thousand bowls of cakes every day, and tens of thousands every day during the New Year's Festival. "I've been doing it for over 30 years without stopping. ”
The history of the Lin family making bowl cakes dates back to 52 years ago. "At that time, my father-in-law went to Chendai to open a bowl cake shop. It took 13 years for him to take over, and I just wanted to help with it, but I didn't expect it to be almost 40 years. Lin Huapian said.
At first, the Lin family's bowl cake shop was opened in Chendai Pengtou Village, and the traditional firewood stove has been used. "At that time, I had to make more than 100 pounds a day, and I started doing it at 9 o'clock in the evening and finished it at 5 o'clock in the morning. Lin Huapian said that most of the finished bowl cakes are wholesaled to pastry sellers, and the rest has to be sold by themselves. "Carrying the burden to Pengtou and the four realms to sell, shouting while walking, as soon as the sound of 'bowl cake' goes out, many people will come out to buy it. Lin Huapian said proudly that many people around Chen Dai grew up eating her bowl cakes, "Many old customers will wait to buy them when the time comes." Some buy a bowl of cake for breakfast, some as a snack, the child is hungry or hungry, give him a bowl of cake, the child is very happy. Lin Huapian said that many people who go to the beach to work will also buy bowls of cakes for breakfast and dry food. "It takes about two hours a day to sell out, and when it's done, I have to go back to the store and continue making rice. ”
In the past, it only cost two cents to sell a bowl of cake, but now it is five cents a piece. Lin Huapian said that he has been making bowl cakes all his life, except for six or seven days off during the Spring Festival, the rest of the time is rain or shine, "I have to eat breakfast when it is windy and rainy, and if someone eats breakfast, we have to do it." ”
Nine years ago, Lin Huapian took Chen Dai's shop and returned to Anhai's home to continue the production of this traditional taste. "When I get older, I come back to my family to do it, and my daughter can help a little. Lin Huapian said that in the past, he did it by himself, which was very hard. In order to continue to do this ancient taste, she returned to Anhai and taught her daughter the craft. Now, her daughter has taken over most of the work, which has saved her a lot of worry.
Tens of thousands of porcelain bowls insist on good taste
The place where it was made has changed, but the taste has not changed, and many of Chendai's old customers still remember the old taste that they have eaten for decades and come to order. The traditional taste has also captured the hearts of the neighbors in the surrounding villages, "Lin Kee's bowl cakes are delicious, and our nearby villages eat her bowl cakes." Shen Yu Drawer of Anhai Anqian Village said that although Anqian Village and Lincuo Village are quite far away, people will still go out of their way to buy Lin's bowl cakes to eat.
Why is the Lin family's bowl cake unforgettable?Lin Huapian said that there is a "secret" to the delicious bowl cake. "Rice has to be good rice, and it has to be Chen's rice. The pulp should be thick, and the temperature of steaming should be well controlled, so that the steamed bowl cake will be 'laughing' and soft and delicious. ”
The ingredients used to make the bowl cake are very simple, as long as you have rice and water, you can make it. But to make a delicious bowl cake, it is not an easy task. "It takes more than a dozen processes to make bowl cakes from the beginning of rice selection to the end of bagging, and it is very particular about rice selection from the first step. Lin Huapian said that the first thing to do is to select good rice to soak in water, and it takes two or three hours to soak the rice. "Our rice is made of three kinds of rice, which is mixed in proportion, which is why our bowl cakes are delicious and taste different from other people's homes. It turned out that in the decades of making bowl cakes, Lin Huapian found that the taste and aroma of simple bowl cake rice (Quanzhou people call bowl cake rice the rice used to make bowl cakes) is relatively ordinary. She tried to mix different rice together, and finally picked out two kinds of rice and a bowl cake rice mix, and finally made her ideal bowl cake full of rice fragrance. "I'm willing to use good rice, you see that the five constant rice is made of incense. Lin Huapian said that in addition to using good rice, rice must also be aged, "The bowl cake made of seasonal rice will stick to the mouth and hands, and the old rice must be used, and the water will be eliminated, and the bowl cake will be delicious." ”
After soaking rice, after soaking rice, the soaked rice should be poured into the rice mill to grind, and the water added when grinding rice will affect the thickness of the slurry water, "the amount of water added should be well controlled, and the slurry water is too thick and too thin will affect the quality of the bowl cake." Lin Huapian said that the ground rice milk should be fermented, which is the most important step in making bowl cakes. The fermentation duration varies from 8 hours to more than 10 hours, depending on whether the weather is cold or cold, and the fermentation time is shorter when the weather is hot. "After fermentation, add white sugar or brown sugar, stir well, and then divide the stirred rice milk into a porcelain bowl, and then go to the furnace to steam," generally steam for about 25 minutes to 30 minutes. Lin Huapian said that the steamed bowl cake should be taken out of the porcelain bowl while it is hot, and it will not be taken out when it is cold. Take it out and pack it, and the production process is finished. She said as she took the cake from the porcelain bowl. I saw her holding the porcelain bowl in one hand, pinching and twisting the other hand to completely pull the bowl cake out of the bowl, and the action was done in one go.
The porcelain bowl in Lin Huapian's hand is specially customized, "We have always used porcelain bowls to make them, and the bowl cakes steamed from porcelain bowls are more hygienic and delicious." "Because of the long-term use of porcelain bowls, Lin Huapian's porcelain bowls are very large, and there are tens of thousands of porcelain bowls at home for a long time. "Five or six thousand of them have to be made to order each time, and some of the old broken corners will be thrown away and refilled. ”
Usually do seventy or eighty pounds, holidays, or the beginning of the year.
1. The day before the fifteenth day has to make two or three hundred catties. Lin Huapian told us that she wants to make more than 5,000 pieces of bowl cakes every day, and tens of thousands of pieces during the New Year's Festival. It takes three people half a day to wash more than 10,000 porcelain bowls alone. "Nowadays, many people will use paper cups to make bowl cakes, which saves trouble and does not need to be washed, but the bowl cakes made from paper cups are unhygienic and not delicious. Over the years, Lin Huapian insisted on eating bowls and cakes that must be made in porcelain bowls, and only during the New Year's holidays, when customers asked to make some sacrificial "blessing cup" bowl cakes, they would be steamed in paper cups. "These bowls of cakes will be 'red' with red pigment on them, symbolizing auspiciousness and festivity. If it is eaten daily, it will not be dotted with this red dot. ”
Innovate and develop ancient flavors in inheritance
Last year, Lin Huapian's daughter, Lin Ali, upgraded the traditional wood-burning stove to a modern technology and standardized the production process.
We upgraded the firewood to an electric steam oven, which is more hygienic and produces better. Lin Ali said that the firewood stove relies on manual control of the fire, and the quality of the firewood is unstable, "The dryness and wetness of the firewood will affect the temperature, and the temperature of the firewood is not easy to control, and the product is good and bad." Moreover, during the production process, the firewood ash will also float onto the bowl cake, which is unhygienic. After we upgraded the process, we retained the traditional good taste, while being more hygienic, the temperature control was better, and the quality of the steamed cakes was more stable. ”
From my grandfather to the present, our family has been making bowl cakes for more than 50 years, and now my mother is old and reluctant to do this craft, so I took over to make it, one is to let her feel at ease someone to inherit her craft, and the other also wants to make this craft have a better development. Lin Ali said that in order to upgrade the entire production workshop and production process, they spent a lot of effort. After upgrading, the mother doesn't have to work so hard, and that alone is worth it.
Now it's not as hard as it used to be, and it saves a lot of effort without burning firewood. Lin Huapian said. The reporter saw that Lin Huapian's hands were soaked white because of long-term washing of rice and porcelain dishes, and the long-term work also caused her waist, legs and feet to suffer a lot.
Lin Ali not only upgraded the production process, but also opened up a new situation for the sales of bowl cakes. In the past, Lin Huapian carried the burden and shouted everywhere;Now, Lin Ali sells his bowl cakes into modern supermarkets, put boxes on supermarket shelves one by one, and send them to pastry shops in major vegetable markets. Lin Ali said.
Okay, okay, this furnace is ready to be baked. Lin Huapian mother and daughter transferred a plate of bowl cakes in the steamer to the board, and the freshly baked bowl cake bloomed into a three-petal flower in a small porcelain bowl, "We said that this is a bowl cake 'laughing', if the bowl cake is not 'laughing', it will be a failure." Lin Huapian said that there is a saying in southern Fujian: fried kueh steamed cake for the New Year. Because the bowl cake needs to be fermented, it takes the meaning of "hair", which represents development, making a fortune, etc., and entrusts people's good wishes. In addition, if the fermentation process is well grasped and the heat is properly controlled during steaming, the top of the cake will resemble a flower, and it will resemble a "smiling face", symbolizing joy. "It's hard work to do this, but I have fun watching the bowl cake every day. Lin Huapian said.
Reporter Huang Hailian Chen Qiaoling).
*: Jinjiang Economic News.