Chapter 8 Betel nut · Amomum · cardamom

I remember that there was a semicircular qin table in the dining room of my ancestor's grandmother, which was filled with all kinds of gourds of various sizes and sizes. Cans, all small and playful. After lunch and dinner every day, it is customary for me to bring this red lacquer plate to my grandmother, and she will pick one or two for chewing.Among them, there are many types of betel nuts: "paste betel nuts" are burnt and crisp, and will break when bitten; "salt water betel nuts" have a layer of salt frost on top, which is astringent and salty; , so it must be placed in a small porcelain jar; "betel nut noodles" are ground betel nuts into very fine powder, and they should also be placed in a porcelain bottle with a lid, so as not to become powdery after being protected from moisture. .

The shops that sell betel nuts in Beiping are called "Yan'erpu". In addition to selling betel nuts, they also sell trendy tobacco, dry tobacco, spindles, Kanto leaves, orchids, high miscellaneous tobacco, and water and dry tobacco.The most famous tobacco shops in Beiping are Nanyufeng and Beiyufeng.Nan Yufeng opened on the big fence of the front door, holding the door frame at the south entrance of the Hutong. The shopkeeper, Lu Mingyuan, is also the general manager of both the north and the south cabinets. Every one or two years, he would always go to Guangdong, Hainan Island, or even Taiwan for a while. trip.He said: "The functions of betel nut are refreshing, quenching thirst, digesting food, transforming water, improving eyesight, stopping dysentery, stopping diarrhea, preventing beriberi, and reducing edema. It is especially effective in repelling insects. The holy medicine of Western medicine, 'Shan Dao Nian'. However, some people in Lingnan like it. Chewing fresh betel nuts, oyster ash, flowering flowers, licorice, lime, and citrus honey together, the taste is both sweet, bitter, and astringent. However, if lime enters the mouth, it is easy to burn the mouth, causing various diseases of the esophagus, liver and stomach, especially The bright red betel nut juice is dyed bloody, which is not hygienic and unsightly. Therefore, Yanerpu only sells betel nuts, and occasionally brings some fresh betel nuts back from the south, just to show everyone that fresh betel nuts are sold in Zhilu. It is absolutely forbidden to sell in several provinces of Henan."

There is a half-moon-shaped small guillotine on the counter of Yanerpu. When customers come to buy betel nuts, they have to split, quarter, and six. Weigh it with a scale and sell it in packs.The betel nut noodles should be bought and ground immediately, and can be divided into three types: thick, medium and thin, so as not to loosen after being ground for a long time.Jujube betel nuts are twice as expensive as ordinary betel nuts, and it is said that they are only produced in Leizhou Peninsula.It is pliable and sweet, and steamed with honey, the more you chew, the more fragrant it becomes. Wang Yuyang wrote a poem to Cheng Geshi back then, and there was a sentence "sitting in a sedan chair and eating betel nuts". It is said that Wang has a special addiction to jujube betel nuts. Betel nuts never left their mouths, which proves that the scholar-official class also loved chewing betel nuts in the early years.Most children like to eat watermelon and drink soda. If they eat too much watermelon, they will jump up and down after drinking soda, and the water will slosh in their stomachs, which is really uncomfortable.If you have betel nut noodles at home, put two spoonfuls of them in your mouth, which are salty and slightly astringent, and you have to hold your breath to chew them twice, otherwise they will choke you, and the water will disappear in a while.

Amomum and cardamom are not sold in Yan'erpu. If you want to eat amomum and cardamom, you have to go to the Chinese medicine shop to buy them.Amomum is produced in Lingnan. It is brown on the outside and white on the inside. It is spicy and refreshing. Chew a few grains after a meal, and it does have the effect of removing oil and greasy.The sausages sold in Box Shop in Beiping need to add a little amomum when filling.Amomum comes from Lingnan, and Cantonese sausage is well-known throughout the country. However, in Dongjiang, Guangdong Province, none of the villages and towns that are good at making sausages add amomum.Once I chatted with the shopkeeper Cao of Baohuazhai in Beiping. When he was young, he visited many provinces in the south and north.He said that Cantonese sausages should be bought and steamed by themselves. They can be eaten immediately. The amomum sausages from Beiping Sauce Knuckle Shop are cooked vegetables to be eaten with wine. fishy.Although what he said is not without reason, it is not known whether it is true.

According to my personal taste, I prefer cardamom.Cardamom is divided into three types: grass cardamom, white cardamom, and nutmeg.Both grass cardamom and white cardamom are produced in Guangdong.Cardamom bark has a thick film, and most of them are used as medicinal materials.The fruit of white cardamom is round, large and yellow, with uniform grains and a strong pungent aroma. It can be used as both medicine and food, so the price is relatively high.Nutmeg is the best produced in Singapore and Sumatra, with a strong aroma. In addition to being used as medicine, high-grade nutmeg can be used as a spice.My classmate Jiang Qing’en came back from a city inspection in Singapore one year, and gave me a bunch of plastic flowers. The young leaves are curled up, the ears are soft and red, and the flowers are like hibiscus.He said that this kind of flower is called Hantaihua in Singapore, and Du Mushi called it "Tingting is more than thirteen, and cardamom is at the beginning of February".I just realized that this is the so-called cardamom flower.

The white cardamom in my grandmother's small porcelain pot is all big and strong. When I was studying, every time I hurriedly finished breakfast and went to school in the middle of winter, I would always take one or two in my sleeve and chew slowly in class. I am addicted to eating for a long time, and I always feel greasy in my chest if I don’t eat it. I didn’t quit the habit of eating cardamom after meals until I was admitted to the university dormitory. Ever since I came to Taiwan, there have been tall palm trees that look like columns, stand alone, and towering above the clouds, but it is hard to tell which one is palm, which is coconut, and which is betel nut tree.As for the stalls selling betel nuts, there are more and more stalls selling betel nuts as you go south. People who eat betel nuts have bright red betel nut juice in their mouths.Twenty or thirty years ago, although people did not know that eating too much betel nuts may cause liver and stomach problems, liver cirrhosis, and esophageal cancer due to mouth ulcers, but spitting out bright red blood-like saliva everywhere is enough to make people feel sick. Disgusting.

One winter I went to Taichung for a meeting, and most of the participants lived in the partner hotel.There is a betel nut stand in front of the hostel. It is said that her Shuangdong betel nut is famous in Taichung. Not only are the betel nuts carefully selected, but also the alley flowers, licorice, lime, and oyster ash are blended just right. After the entrance, it is very pleasant and intoxicating.Mr. Chen Guanling, who went with him, is from Dongguang County, Hebei Province. When he was in mainland China, he was used to eating betel nuts, cardamoms and other appetizers. I put it in my mouth and started chewing, but within a quarter of an hour, my face suddenly turned red and my eyes were flushed as if I had been drunk, and then I felt chills and felt like vomiting.When we saw that the situation was not good, we immediately invited a western doctor, Wang Wenlin, to come. With both acupuncture and medicine, the man stabilized.

According to Dr. Wang: "Lime is a strong alkaline substance, and it is easy to damage the oral mucosa when chewed. According to the recent statistics from the Taiwan Medical Association, people who eat betel nuts suffer from oral cancer. The rate is over 65%. It’s better not to eat it.” Dr. Wang’s explanation made me wary of Taiwan’s fresh betel nuts, and I didn’t even dare to touch them.Zhizi was in a hurry to ask whether the various dried betel nuts that he ate in mainland China would cause the same terrible cancer as fresh betel nuts.I think betel nut itself has the benefits of digesting water, improving eyesight and quenching thirst. Without lime and oysters, the trouble should not be so severe.

In the former Qing Dynasty, when the younger generations visited their elders, according to the etiquette of the nobles, they handed over their wishes, and the general banner people handed over their work. "Working work" was very popular in those days, but now it has become an antique. People under the age of 40 have not only never seen it, but have not even heard of it. Pass.There are ten kinds of work in a box, and six pieces for the least. It is divided into large and small purses (the big lotus is packed with silver ingots, and the small lotus is packed with betel nuts and cardamom), fan nets, chopsticks sets, knife sets, mirror sets, glasses cases, and cigarette purses. And so on, the materials are divided into silk and satin, and the methods include Kesi, flat gold, brocade, painted embroidery, embroidered embroidery, and velvet.If it comes from the wonderful hands of Xuangui, then the skillful needles of the magic needle are much more valuable than the selected top grades sold in the incense powder shop!

When Mr. Wei Bircong was in charge of the Taiwan provincial government, he once entertained foreign guests in a Taipei hotel. There was a French lady, who was the best friend of Dr. Zheng Yuxiu's classmate when Mrs. Wei was studying in France.The lady's husband-in-law had been a French military attache in China for many years in the Beiyang era. He had lived in Peiping for a long time, and he also developed a habit of eating dates and betel nuts.After lunch and dinner every day, he always eats one or two pills to make his stomach feel better, so every year he asks someone to go to Sumatra to buy ten or eight pounds of jujube betel nuts, soak them in red wine for a month or two, and then dry them in the sun. Save it and use it anytime.She knows that toasting betel nuts is a Chinese etiquette. After the banquet, she takes it herself. Of course, she must respect Mrs. Wei first. Unexpectedly, Mrs. Wei is suffering from a toothache, and I was sitting next to it, so Mrs. Wei specially introduced me to chew it. Betel nuts, and there is a lot of research on eating betel nuts.The noble lady met her kindred spirits, and overjoyed, she offered me a few pieces of betel nuts specially made by her, with dark plums and female appearance, implying the aroma of wine, which was different from those who steamed cheese with honey.It's a pity that the rare food with astringent and slightly sweet taste has been missing for more than 20 years.

At the turn of autumn and winter in 1947, I was bored after dinner with Brother You Mijian in Taichung, and went shopping in antique shops in Taichung. Gu.He specializes in searching for some unpopular and unpopular products, such as warts and wood, and strange wheel traps.Probably Boss Yan of Shiguzhai knew our mayor’s hobby, so he took out a pair of Kesi purses from the inner cabinet and asked him to appreciate them. There was also a yellow paper stick hanging on the silk rope that tied the purses, which read: "Appreciate Yulang" three small characters.Boss Yan said that this pair of purses was given to him by a clan in the former Qing Dynasty when they came to live with him in Taiwan from the mainland.It is said that this kind of small-sized purse is used to hold betel nuts and cardamom. Because Kesi purses are rare, he kept them.Ask me who Yulang is, and I tell him that Yulang is a son of a son. Yulang was one of the five ministers in the late Qing Dynasty who went abroad. After returning to China, he helped Zai Tao train the new army and was Zai Tao's right-hand man.If this pair of purses were given to Yulang, they should be prized by the superiors and come from the inner court.You Yeai bought this pair of purses with ancient colors and gold inlays, so they bought them at a very small price. In the recent Tainan Folklore Cultural Relics Exhibition, there was also a pair of red purses embroidered with a branch of auspicious flowers on display at the venue. Compare and merge.