Chapter 67 Wine of Hengyang Lake

Every time I go on a business trip to Hengyang, I have to taste the wine of the lake in Hengyang with a frail body, savor the sweet and sticky taste of the wine, and feel the overwhelming drunkenness and hazy comfort. Hengyang Lake wine, also known as 醽醁 wine, is a traditional ancient wine in Hengyang. It has been used as a tribute wine for members of the royal family since the Northern Wei Dynasty.Because Hengyang is rich in 醽醁 wine, it is known as the hometown of 醽醁.According to "Yi Tong Zhi" in the Qing Dynasty: Linghu Lake is located in the east of Hengyang County, and the water can be used to make wine, so it is named "醽醁jiu".Now Linghu Township, Zhuhui District, Hengyang City, is surrounded by Leishui. The Linghu Lake in the jurisdiction is azure and green, with sweet water quality. The wine made from the lake water has a very mellow taste, sweet and greasy.The rice wine produced nearby is also called Linglv and Lingying.

The wine of Hengyang Lake has a history of more than 3,000 years. It is a unique color wine in China - green wine, which disappeared in the late Qing Dynasty.Now it has become a white paste with occasional distiller's grains suspended in it.Ruan Yue, the Zhijun of Chenzhou in the Northern Song Dynasty, wrote a poem "Chenjiang Baiyong" to describe the wine in the lake: "Jade is a curved tiller, and a stone is a clay, and thousands of pots are not dry. Every family has alcohol at the foot of the mountain, and they use this spring for brewing." "Tong Dian" contains: "Hengyang, Han Ling County. There is Lingshui Lake, and the wine is mellow. In 280, Sima Yan established the Western Jin Dynasty and recommended spirit wine to Taimiao. It was regarded as the best sacrificial wine for ancestors by the emperors of all dynasties, and became one of the top ten tribute wines in ancient China. The signboard and the good talk of the literati.

Lake wine was originally homemade wine brewed by farmers near Linghu Lake. It gradually entered the market and was accepted by drinkers.In the twenty-fourth year of the Republic of China (1935), the Shanghai edition of "China Industry Magazine" stated: Hunan wine is produced in Hengyang as the most famous, and there is a famous wine from Linghu Lake, which was called Lingyin wine in ancient times. , the name is Hengjiu, its quality is light, and its taste is mellow, which is inferior to that of other counties in Hunan Province.At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, there were 179 winemaking workshops in Hengyang City, with an annual output of 32,600 tons of wine.The hotels in Hengyang city are all over the streets and alleys, the most concentrated is near the Qingcao Bridge, where the steamed water and the Xiangshui River converge, and the Qingcao Bridge crosses it, opposite to the Shigu Academy. Showing off, hunting and dancing, there are poems praising the "Hundreds of Liquor at the Head of the Green Grass Bridge".

Under the reputation of the wine of Hengyang Lake, the villages of Hengyang followed suit one after another, using the good water from all over the place to brew mellow wine.The wine of Xidu in Hengyang County is green out of the blue, and its name gradually surpassed that of the wine in modern times.Nanyue Shoushan Mountain has criss-cross streams and ravines, famous springs springing up one after another, like clouds and streams, and there are many winemakers, the most famous of which is Nanyue wine.Today, in Hengyang Township, every household brews wine from the lake as home wine, and it has become a custom to entertain guests with wine from the lake during festivals, weddings and weddings.Lake wine has a wide range of uses. In addition to drinking, it can be used as a cooking seasoning, to remove rot and fishy smell, and to add color and fragrance.Eggs washed with distiller's grains and starch, and glutinous rice balls boiled with sweet distiller's grains are delicious, and have become folk customs during the Spring Festival and Lantern Festival.

After packaging, the wine of Hengyang Lake is exported to Japan, the United States, South Africa, Southeast Asia, Taiwan, etc., and is famous overseas.The wine of the lake is famous all over the world for its aroma, taste and color. The wine of Hengyang Lake belongs to sweet rice wine and fermented wine, with fine materials and rigorous craftsmanship. It uses local traditional tribute rice and hemp glutinous rice as raw materials, washes with mineral water from Jinniaojing, soaks, cooks, cools, and saccharifies. , It is brewed by traditional techniques such as multiple fermentations, filtration, and sealing in ceramic small tanks.

The wine of the lake is golden and transparent, full-bodied and sweet, known as Sanxiang, that is, it smells light, drinks sweet, and has a lingering fragrance after pouring.The wine of the lake has three major elements: rice, water and koji. With the proper combination, the brewed wine is very mellow and contains a lot of multivitamins and 26 kinds of amino acids necessary for the human body.Lake wine is low-alcohol, nutritious, healthy, fashionable, purely brewable, without blending, and without adding any chemical ingredients. The elderly drink it to prolong life, and children drink it to promote healthy development.It can relieve heat and quench thirst in summer, and can drive away cold and warm up in winter. Drinking it makes people feel refreshed and refreshed.

The wine of the best lake is milky yellow or amber in color, shiny, without turbidity or suspended matter, soft and mellow in taste, delicious and clear aftertaste, fragrant and fragrant, and various flavors are very harmonious.Take a small sip, move the surface of your tongue, and taste the taste slowly, the wine juice slowly flows into your throat, a warm current spreads from your stomach to your whole body, and your nerves are quickly excited.