China News Agency, Jiangmen, March 5th, title: In the early spring, the cake fragrance festival in Taishan, Guangdong is strong
Author Li Xiaochun Guo Jun
In early spring, it is advisable to walk in spring and visit graves.
In Taishan City, Jiangmen, Guangdong, usually from the second day of the second month of the lunar calendar, there are public activities of sweeping tombs and worshiping ancestors (also known as "walking mountains"). The "Xingshan Ci" from Beijing began to sell well, and merchants specializing in this type of pastry ushered in the peak season of the year until the Ching Ming Festival.
Right now, cake shops and restaurants in Taicheng Street and nearby towns in Taishan have placed Tangshui Ci, Fat Cake, and Soft Cake in conspicuous positions for customers to choose from.
Chefs at Meiyuan Bakery in Taicheng, Taishan City are making soft cakes.
Photo by Li Xiaochun
"There are 10 soft cakes in a box, 20 yuan per box (RMB, the same below) with char siew stuffing, 15 yuan per box with chicken Ying stuffing and bean paste stuffing. These are freshly baked and put into boxes after they are cooled. We choose High-quality glutinous rice flour makes soft cakes that are very soft and glutinous.” The staff of Meiyuan Bakery in Taicheng said that until the Ching Ming Festival, orders will increase significantly every weekend.
As a famous hometown of overseas Chinese, Taishan locals are different from those in other places in their ancestor worship schedule, sacrifice food selection and sacrifice methods.
Since the 1980s and 1990s, whenever overseas folks in Taishan returned to the village to visit their graves and pay respects to their ancestors, the nearby villagers had the habit of helping out and "tashanwang" (sharing food after the ancestor worship ceremony). When ordering rice cakes, they will deliberately order more, and even send "Rishee" to express their blessings and thanks.
The local people in Baisha Town, Taishan City use sesame seed cakes for sweeping tombs and offering sacrifices to their ancestors.
Photo by Li Xiaochun
"In recent years, some folks who have returned to Taishan from other places or abroad to celebrate the Spring Festival, for the sake of convenience, choose a date for a 'mountain hike' in the first month, and then go out after completion. In the first month of this year, we received a lot of orders for mountain citron. "Zhang Qixing, the person in charge of the Yixiang Bun Shop in Wuxu Town, Sijiu Town, Taishan, introduced that in the near future, more sugar water glutinous rice cakes and soft cakes will be prepared for the morning market every day.
"In Taishan, there are two flavors of soft cakes, salty and sweet. The salty ones are mainly filled with barbecued pork, and the sweet ones are stuffed with bean paste and chicken." said Zhen Shuangmiao, a food lover in Taishan.
She believes that soft cakes are good products with thin crust, nice filling, charred outside and soft inside, and moderate saltiness and sweetness.
When it comes to grave-sweeping food, she recommends charcoal-grilled biscuits in Baisha Town, which are similar in shape and taste to charcoal-baked soft cakes.
At present, some merchants in Baisha Town insist on making biscuits with charcoal baking technology. There are 6 special ovens on site at the same time, filling, filling, unloading and selling biscuits.
The special oven has three floors, the upper, the middle, and the lower. The upper and lower floors are charcoal fires, and the middle is a shallow pan.
Just put the small dough wrapped with fillings in advance into the pan, then move the upper layer of charcoal fire to the top of the cake, heat evenly from top to bottom, and it will be baked in about 10 minutes.
This baking method is similar to that of Enping biscuits, but the taste is different.
Master Huang Xijun bakes and sells sesame seed cakes at Baisha Market, Baisha Town, Taishan City.
Photo by Li Xiaochun
"We started to set up a stall on the ninth day of the first month of this year. We started baking early in the morning every day. We started work early on market days or weekends, and closed the stall after the Ching Ming Festival. While baking and selling here, people in the market will 'smell the fragrance' Come', they are often sold out as soon as they come out of the oven." Recently, Master Huang Xijun, who set up a stall in Baishaxu, said.
Inheriting the craftsmanship of his elders in the family, he has been involved in making sesame seed cakes for more than 30 years, and the products of his stall are widely favored in the local area.
"He has a lot of flavors here, including original flavor, sweet potato, chicken, tangerine peel, red bean paste, barbecued pork, ice meat, etc. The price per kilogram is between 24 yuan and 32 yuan. Every time I come to help, I want to buy all kinds of flavors Some, take them back and share with relatives and friends." said Ms. Huang, a Kaiping citizen who was waiting to pack sesame seed cakes.
Restricted by the production process, it is difficult to greatly increase the production capacity of charcoal-grilled biscuits.
"When there are a lot of orders, we have to rush to make them all night. Yesterday we sold 500 kilograms, and at the peak, we could sell more than 900 kilograms a day." Huang Xijun said that only with this special oven, the baked cakes have a traditional flavor, especially When just out of the oven, the crust is crispy, the inner layer is fragrant and soft, the filling is hot, and the taste is very rich.
Freshly baked soft cakes, the upper and lower layers of the skin are burnt yellow.
Li Xiaochun
With the development of society, people's positioning of traditional cakes has gradually changed. The Taishan "Xingshan Ci" used to worship ancestors, now under the continuous innovation of the masters, the taste has improved, the taste has increased, and the appearance More refined, in addition to meeting the needs of ancestor worship, it can also make the local people a real treat.
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