The Xinhua mountain people in the depths of Meishan have some ancient customs.Entering the twelfth lunar month, every family struggles for chopping meat.The adults discuss the time and butcher to kill the New Year's pig, the day to pickle the New Year's meat, the time to smoke the New Year's meat and the firewood to cook the meat on the cutting board. As the saying goes: "Adults look forward to planting the fields, and children look forward to the New Year." The children in the family are most eager to celebrate the New Year. They are busy preparing firewood and waiting for the New Year.New Year's Eve is the day when Meishan people send them to welcome the new year, and it is also the busiest time for Meishan families.They have to summarize the past year, and prepare the best food for the new year to entertain guests, especially the new year's meat, which needs to be serious.

The annual meat is a piece of pork butt top meat, about 20 catties.After the butcher kills the New Year’s pig and disembowels it, when it’s time to chop the meat, he has to ask the housewife how to cut and marinate the New Year’s meat without any sloppy and mistakes.The housewife first chooses the side with the tail, and decides the length of the annual meat according to the size of the pig.About 20 catties of annual pigs of about 300 catties are chopped off, and 15 or 6 catties of new year pigs are chopped off of 160 to 70 catties.Butt tip meat is the place where the lean meat is the most concentrated on the pig. The meat is thick, lean meat is in pieces, and there is little fat.In families with girls and boys, the housewife asks to chop off the meat with the elbows.

Elbows are the highest gift for Meishan mountain people to entertain guests. Direct relatives must use elbows to entertain guests when they come to pay New Year's greetings; for young couples married in the previous year, the groom must treat them with elbows when they go to pay New Year's greetings.Secondly, elbows are the main dish for breakfast on the first day of the Spring Festival. The family has to use a knife to cut the skin or lean meat for the elbows, which is a good start. Nian meat is generally a whole piece of meat and is never chopped.Smart housewives, when the butcher chops meat, ask the butcher to cut several slits evenly in the heart of the meat, leaving the skin where the meat is connected, and the slits are one inch wide.During the marinating process, the salt is directly applied to the knife edge, allowing the brine to soak into the meat to achieve a quick marinating effect.After marinating for about three days, hang the new year’s meat that is still dripping with salt water on the beam of the stove, and smoke it with firewood smoke. After about half a month, the skin of the new year’s meat will be smoked golden, and the meat will be covered with smoke, and it will become perfect. Year meat.

Nian meat is the main dish during the first half of the Spring Festival (from the first day of the lunar new year to the Lantern Festival), and every meal should be served in a large bowl.No matter whether the guests eat or not, there must be a bowl to fill up.Exquisite families do not eat fresh meat or cook meat during the Spring Festival. In order to be busy with the New Year's Eve dinner, Meishan mountain people changed from three meals a day to two meals, or changed to Chinese food for the New Year's Eve dinner.After breakfast, the mountain people prepare to kill the chicken, which is the main dish of the reunion dinner, and every household will cook this dish.On the first day of the new year, the mountain people who raise chickens at home do not eat chicken.For other vegetables in the reunion dinner, there are generally six bowls of vegetables, such as pork belly, whole fish, and pork kidneys. You never eat seven or eight bowls, and you can make nine or more bowls.

After the meal, the whole family prepares for the New Year.The housewife sweeps the floor, and the housekeeper carries water and chops firewood.After the adults cleaned the pot, the work of cooking the New Year's meat was handed over to the children, who lit the fire and cooked the meat. Blackened New Year's meat, washed in warm water to remove traces of smoke.Use a cast iron pot to cook Nian meat. If the pot is small, cut it into two or three pieces along the knife marks; if the pot is large, put the whole piece into the pot and cook.Add more dry firewood to the fired firewood, the firepower is strong and the speed is fast.Families with conditions will also burn a few maple firewood, and the cooked meat will be more fragrant.Cook for half an hour to forty minutes. The housewife tries it with chopsticks, and if it can be inserted into the skin of the meat, don't cook it.

The housewife took the Nian meat out of the pot and placed it on the cutting board.Cut off the part with the tail, and put it on the Eight Immortals table in the main room, ready to worship the ancestors.For other meat, cut off the elbow and start to reduce the meat, which is to finely process the annual meat.First cut into strips according to the knife marks, and then cut into small pieces with two fingers square, and place them neatly on the chopping board.The annual meat exudes a strong meaty aroma. This kind of meaty aroma is different from ordinary meat. It is mixed with the salty aroma of lean meat, the fragrance of shredded meat, the aroma of fat meat and the rich mellow aroma.It gives people great temptation and attraction, and they have the urge to eat.

The housewife wore an apron and stood by the chopping board, carefully cutting up the New Year's meat. The children were already in a circle, but no one started.When the housewife finishes cutting the fat meat, she puts it aside and begins to cut the pure lean meat, the aroma becomes stronger and more irritating to the nostrils.The housewife cuts several chunks of lean meat and pinches one for each child; the children can refuse or ask for a replacement, and the housewife will pinch it for him according to the child's instructions, hand it to him, or stuff it into his mouth.The children took the delicious meat on the cutting board, and while they ate, they went back to the stove to warm up, chat, and listen to stories told by their grandparents.The housewife picked up a small piece of lean meat and stuffed it into her mouth. While eating, she gave each grandparent a piece of lean meat.Go back to the cutting board and cut a large piece of lean meat for your husband who is offering sacrifices to the ancestors, and wait for him to return to the kitchen.The husband just finished sacrificing the ancestors, stepped into the kitchen door, and called the children to set off firecrackers.The housewife stuffed the cut meat into her husband's mouth and said, "It's Chinese New Year, you should eat a piece of meat too!"

Amidst the sound of firecrackers, the whole family began to bid farewell to the New Year and watch the fireworks.The grown-ups often take a moment to return to the kitchen and take this opportunity to eat more chopping meat to express their hard work and happiness for a year. Today's children no longer worry about the taste of chopping meat, but sit by the TV and watch the Spring Festival Gala.The housewife brought the cut meat to the children, saying that the meat on the chopping board was delicious, and gave each child a lump, and they were not allowed to go to bed until they had finished eating.The children pick and choose, looking for the smallest lump, and eat it as if they are old.

The red chopping board meat can clearly see the distance between the shreds of meat.The mountain people ate the meat on the cutting board, and no one devoured it hungrily. They held it in their hands, pulled the lean meat, chewed it into their mouths, and slowly savored its mellow aroma.There is a sense of fullness, fullness, solidity, and strong taste. The housewife greeted everyone and went back to the cutting board to continue cutting the new year's meat.After cutting up the new year's meat, put it into the pot, turn on the fire, simmer the new year's meat with the residual heat of Mars, and then go to watch the year.The long night passed slowly amid the harvest and joy of the Shushuo family.The rooster crows for the first time, and the housewife sends the children to bed and packs up the meat before going to bed.It was just dawn, and I got up again to start the busy New Year.