Chapter 60 Chongqing Rabbit Shrimp

The food in Chongqing can be summed up in two words, one is stir-fry and the other is hot pot. In the stir-fry and hot pot, the most exciting and imaginative thing is the redness.Red is the color of Chongqing cuisine itself and is also the main color. Every dish is so hot that the diners will applaud with enthusiasm and appetite. I am a Hunan native who loves to eat chili. I have had some contact with those masters who eat chili. After spending more time together, I have gradually become an admirer of chili. I have never left behind or quit because of chili. .This time I ate some very spicy dishes in Chengdu, and I didn’t feel afraid of spicy food. When I came to Chongqing, I was a little flinched and afraid when I saw the bright red hot pot soup with hot peppers floating on it.

When I arrived in Chongqing, many friends introduced me to eat hot pot to experience the enthusiasm and spicyness of Chongqing.Speaking of hot pot, Chongqing is the birthplace of it, because the hot pot has pushed the food to a more comfortable and enjoyable level.Let hot pot become popular in China's catering industry for a while, hotels and guesthouses of all sizes are vying to use it, and family life has also begun to spread the atmosphere of hot pot.Since then, many fresh eating methods and practices have been born in the food industry, bringing warmth to eating and drinking in winter.

To investigate the origin of hot pot, we have to draw in the geographical environment of the Yangtze River passing through Chongqing. In the Three Gorges area of ​​the Yangtze River, there are many trackers and boat people. Having a fire to eat and warm the body also had to heat the food in the pot all the time to keep the temperature of the food.It was slowly quoted by people on the shore, and the hot pot has slowly spread since then.While Chongqing people are using hot pot wantonly, the Chinese food industry is also looking for a better way to eat. In this way, a hot pot has adapted to the needs of the development of Chinese food, and hot pot has become popular all over the country, making the food industry popular application.Another supplementary statement is that the air in Chongqing is relatively humid throughout the year, and the humidity is too heavy. Residents use hot pot to heat their bodies, which is conducive to drying the air and expelling waste from the body. This seems to be somewhat insufficient evidence.

When I came to Chongqing, I wanted to learn more about food and try to taste some of my favorite food, but I didn’t have time to enjoy it.Led by my friends Jiang Haisong and Liu Haiyan, I found a hotpot restaurant in the area of ​​Jiefangbei in the center of Chongqing and sat down for lunch.The restaurant is at the intersection of Wuyi Road and Kaixuan Road. The store is not big, on the third floor.I don’t know the food situation in Chongqing. Of course, I handed over the task to Jiang and Liu who have lived in Chongqing for more than three years. Liu works for the "Chongqing Evening News". .

On the table, there is a large pot of white shrimp, the light red ones are lying in the pot, and against the fiery red hot pot soup, the shrimp looks whiter and bigger.What surprised me was the shape and posture of the prawns. Each prawn was cut vertically from the back, and the prawn meat was pulled to the two sides, and the prawn became a big V-shaped hook.In the pulled shrimp meat, there is no red soup color, but the white and tender shrimp meat is bursting, which is very delicious.The fire of the hot pot slowly started to increase, and the soup began to roll, and the hot air spread to all directions with the aroma, and floated into my nose. It was a very mellow shrimp smell.

Liu told me that the prawns are locally produced in Chongqing and come from the Yangtze River. Fishermen catch fresh river prawns, and then use the special crispy method of Chongqing cuisine to make sweet and fragrant fresh river prawns, without other cooking methods.It is said that the Yangtze River passes through Chongqing. There are many small gullies on the banks of the densely vegetation-covered river. The shrimps hide in the backwater bays of the gullies under the impact of the current. Whenever the flood passes, the shrimps gather in piles. In Huishui Bay, fishermen only need to use a large dustpan to salvage.In the summer when the water is rising, the prawns are the most plump, and also the time when the taste is the most pure, fresh, crisp and tender. Eating river prawns is better than eating pork.

I like to eat Jiwei shrimp in Changsha. This is the first time I have eaten shrimp in hot pot. I find it interesting. I want to eat it and taste it.I picked one up and peeled off the outer skin like eating Jiwei shrimp, but the shrimp meat is not as soft as Jiwei shrimp. It is very elastic and tough to bite, and it is very crisp. When it is bitten off, it does not have the fishy smell of ordinary river shrimp, but it is edible. It has a crispy sweet taste, which is very natural and not greasy.I also found that the shrimp skin is also very crispy, and it tastes very fragrant, without the shelly feeling of eating other shrimps.

After eating it slowly, I realized that there are large pieces of konjac in the river prawns, which are as big as a palm but thinner. After being boiled in shrimp soup, they are also very delicious.There are also sections of cucumbers that have been cut open one by one, which taste crisp and loud, and the crispness, sweetness and tenderness of the cucumbers are well preserved, and the smell of cucumber pulp has disappeared.There are also black fungus and square pieces of kelp, mainly in the crispy aspect.The most hidden thing is the rabbit meat in the hot pot, which is cut into finger-sized cubes. When the shrimp is almost eaten, the rabbit cubes will show the soup noodles and roll in the yellow soup. It tastes very fresh and tender. , and sweet and mellow.