Food starts with noodles

This time Xu Zhuo didn't refuse, on the contrary, he was very interested.

The reason is simple. This dish is very popular in the capital area. Almost all traditional old shops have this dish, and some shops even have to book in advance to eat it.

As for this dish, Xu Zhuo once learned about it in the back kitchen of Ji's Roast Duck Restaurant.

The recipe of this dish is very simple, mainly highlighting a fresh word.

The so-called live fish is the freshly killed fish. After the scales are removed and dissected, the knife is changed. .

When one-third of the sauce in the pot is left and becomes thick, you can remove the fish from the pot and place on a plate.

Then continue to collect the remaining soup and pour it on the fish, so that the dish is ready.

There is no frying or pan-frying in the whole cooking process, so the fish is very tender.

In terms of recipe, this dish is a bit similar to West Lake Vinegar Fish. They cook fresh fish directly with sauce, but they use different seasonings and different heats, so the cooked fish also presents two different flavors. .

Seeing that Xu Zhuo was interested, Ni Changye said happily: "When this is over, let's go to my house together, and I will teach you how to make this dish."

After speaking, he took out his mobile phone, pulled out a number and called.

"Old Zhao, is your fish stall in stock today? Leave me a carp about two catties, which needs to be raised in clean water for three days, and don't give me the one that just came back.

The earthy smell of the domestic species just brought back is too strong to be eaten at all.

It's still the old rule, I take it home and slaughter it myself, don't worry about it.This fish must be fresh and alive, I don't want dead fish, dumb fish, fish with belly turned over. "

After finishing speaking, he hung up the phone: "I have an old neighbor who sells fish in a nearby vegetable market. I have bought fish from his house all these years."

Xu Zhuo asked curiously, "What do you mean by keeping them in clear water for three days? Is it so particular about making live fish in sauce?"

His attitude of not being ashamed to ask questions drew out Ni Changye's desire to teach.

Now that the banquet was officially opened, Ni Changye took Xu Zhuo to sit down and began to explain to Xu Zhuo the importance of stocking fish in clean water for a few days before cooking.

All freshwater fish, no matter whether it is farmed or wild, the waters where fish can grow up are basically rich in nutrients and there are also a lot of plankton in the water.

Fish that grow up in this environment will have some microorganisms attached to their bodies, which will inevitably bring some peculiar smell to the fish.

Such as muddy smell, such as some other peculiar smells.

If the fish is freshly cooked, these smells cannot be completely removed, and the fish meat will have some peculiar smell to some extent.

After the returned freshwater fish are kept in clean water for two or three days, the impurities in the body and body will be excreted through excretion and breathing, and the impurities in the fish will be significantly reduced.

If you do it again at this time, the taste of the fish will be much better.

This method is especially suitable for farmed freshwater fish. Because the breeding density of this kind of fish is too high and the fish grows fast, the peculiar smell on the body is heavier.

"Not only live fish in sauce need to do this, but all non-fried fish dishes like West Lake vinegar fish need to do this, otherwise the fish will not taste good.

Take the West Lake Vinegar Fish as an example, which is a representative dish of Zhejiang cuisine, but the evaluation of this dish on the Internet is surprisingly poor.

The reason is that the fish used in this dish has not been stocked in clean water, and the fishy smell is too strong.

Of course, the source of the fish is also different. In the past, the West Lake vinegar fish used wild grass carp from the West Lake and surrounding waters, but now they are all farmed, and the quality of the fish is not the same.

It is not surprising that the fish meat is not tasty. "

Xu Zhuo discovered that Ni Changye, like the old man, was also a fanatic fan of Lu cuisine. As for other cuisines, he could step on them as much as he could. Anyway, Lu cuisine is just as good as it gets.

Fortunately, Dai Zhenting was not invited this time, otherwise Dai might fight Ni Changye.

After all, in Dai Zhenting's eyes, except for Zhejiang cuisine, other cuisines are his younger brothers, so when someone tramples on Zhejiang cuisine like this, he will definitely not be able to bear it.

Of course, this intolerance is also divided.

For example, the old man despised Zhejiang cuisine more than once, but Dai Zhenting never heard of it.

The matter of the chef of the state banquet, can this be called cowardice?

After the meal, everyone rested for a while, and started the various rules and regulations of the Shandong Cuisine Chefs Alliance. Xu Zhuo didn't need to participate in this matter, he just needed to sit in the front row and be a mascot.

In this way, I continued to toss until four o'clock in the afternoon before the whole process was completed.

After the end, Xu Zhuo said hello and farewell to the chefs he was familiar with one by one, added a circle of WeChat, and listened to countless compliments.

After finally dismissing all these people, he and Ni Changye took the subway to Ni's house.

He Guoan was doing nothing, so he also followed.

Originally, the old man and Ji Wenxuan also wanted to come and see, but their apprentices who have been teachers for many years are here, and they will definitely meet again tonight. Under such circumstances, the two of them naturally cannot follow.

However, the two old men have already made an appointment with Ni Changye, and they will have a good cooking discussion later.

Although the old man dislikes all kinds of chefs outside of Shandong cuisine, he is still very polite to the chefs inside Shandong cuisine, because these chefs are already the only remaining traditional Shandong cuisine masters.

For younger chefs, soups and so on have already begun to superficial, and even rely on thick soup treasures.

Such a chef naturally cannot catch the eyes of the old chef.

Taking the subway to the small alley where Ni's family is located, Ni Changye led Xu Zhuo to turn left and right, and came to a small vegetable market deep in the alley.

At this time, because it was approaching evening, there were many people shopping for vegetables, basically all of them were from nearby households.

When he came to the fish stall, the old fish seller immediately took out two live fish from the house, and presented them to Ni Changye as if they were treasures: "You can pick these two as you like, they were brought in the day before yesterday, and they were raised in clean water. After several days, all the sand and sand were vomited away.”

Ni Changye looked at the fish eyes and picked out a male carp.

After the selection, the three bought some other dishes, and then went back to Ni's house to cook.

He Guoan will also cook the live fish in sauce that Ni Changye is going to cook today. This dish is considered an entry-level dish for Lu cuisine chefs in the capital area.

After arriving home, Ni Changye put the fish in clean water and continued to soak it.

This fish has to be eaten and killed first, so that it tastes good. If it is killed in advance, the taste and texture of the fish will be greatly reduced, so don't worry.

The three of them first prepared the ingredients they bought, cleaned the ones that needed to be cleaned, and changed the ones that needed to be changed.

Once ready, start cooking.

It was said to be cooking, but Ni Changye did not kill the fish. Instead, he set up a frying pan, added water to the pan, and then turned on a high fire to boil the water.

After the water was boiled, he took the fish, scraped off the scales with a knife, then disemboweled the belly, removed the internal organs and gills, snapped off the fish teeth, and pulled out the carp's fishy thread.

After doing this, he put the whole fish on the chopping board and began to modify the knife.

Chapter 1487 Recipe of Live Fish in Sauce

Ni Changye is a very serious person. Not only did he clean up the whole carp, he even cleaned up the black membranes in the fish's belly.

As for the blood stasis, he even cleaned it up.

After cleaning up, he put the whole fish on the chopping board, turned his face and said to Xu Zhuo: "The knife for making live fish with sauce is very particular, the distance between the knife edges should not be too wide, otherwise the fish will not be cooked through easily.

But it should not be too narrow. If it is too narrow, it will easily spread the fish meat and cause the whole fish to be incomplete. "

Xu Zhuo nodded, indicating that he understood.

He was not lying. When Ni Changye started killing fish, Xu Zhuo had already learned the skills of this dish. If there was only one fish now, Xu Zhuo even wanted to try it out.

Ni Changye took a kitchen knife and started cutting from behind the gills of the fish. He cut along the body of the fish until he reached the backbone of the fish.

The lower part of the belly of the fish has not been cut off, but is still connected.

"Remember, the upper half of the fish body must be cut to the backbone of the fish, because the upper half of the fish meat is relatively thick, and if it is not cut to the end, the taste will not be easily absorbed.

But there is no need to cut the second half to the end, because the fish meat in the second half is relatively loose, and if the cut is too deep, the fish meat will easily fall apart. "

After cutting this knife, Ni Changye briefly explained the essentials of making this dish, then moved the kitchen knife, stopped when it was less than one centimeter away from the first knife, and continued to cut.

After cutting, Ni Changye said: "The place where the meat is thick, the spacing should be smaller, about [-] centimeters is fine, and where the fish is thinner, the spacing can be appropriately relaxed to [-] centimeter."

After finishing speaking, he continued to cut, but moved his body deliberately so that Xu Zhuo could observe and check.

Xu Zhuo carefully watched the movements in Ni Changye's hands. This step seemed simple, but it was actually somewhat difficult.

Because when cutting, if you are not careful, the edge of the knife will deviate, and the edge of the cut will not be vertically downward, but will be skewed to one side.

In addition, the top of the fish skin is greasy, and it is easy to lose your hand when cutting.

The bones in the fish, such as the ribs of the fish, will become the resistance of the kitchen knife when cutting.

These seem simple, but to be perfect, you must practice more.

After changing the knife, the water in the pot also boiled.

Holding the tail of the fish, Ni Changye quickly put the whole fish into the boiling hot water. After about two or three seconds, he lifted the fish out again.

"This step is to remove the fishy smell from the fish. At the same time, it is to make the fish skin curl and expose the knife edge, so that when it is simmering later, the taste of the sauce will penetrate into the fish more easily."

As Ni Changye said, he pointed to the body of the fish that had just been scalded in boiling water for Xu Zhuo to look at.

In order to deepen Xu Zhuo's impression, he also specially reminded two sentences: "The time to blanch in water must be shorter, a few seconds is enough, if the time is too long, the fish will be completely cooked and the fish will fall apart. "

He put the fish aside and began to control the water, then poured out the water in the pot for blanching the fish, washed it again, and put the pot on the stove.

This dish of live fish in sauce does not need many ingredients, only cooked lard sweet noodle sauce and white sugar as three condiments, and as for the ingredients, only a little minced ginger is enough.

Nothing else.

But now, in order to increase the appearance and appearance, the minced ginger is usually replaced with ginger juice, and some chopped green onions or chopped coriander are also sprinkled.

This can not only increase the appearance, but also use chives and coriander to suppress the unremoved fishy smell.

The best of both worlds.

To make this dish, the ratio of the three condiments of lard, white sugar and sweet noodle sauce is 1:1:1. This ratio can make the sauce suitable for saltiness, and at the same time, the fragrance is completely sufficient.

Ni Changye put lard, white sugar and sweet noodle sauce into the pot, then poured a bowl of water, and stirred the pot with a spoon while heating.

When all the three condiments melted and turned into a dark brown soup, Ni Changye added water to the pot again, this time adding more, about half the pot.

After adding the water, turn up the heat and let the soup in the pot boil quickly.

After boiling, skim off the scum in the pot, stir it a few times with a spoon, then put the carp that has controlled the water into the pot and start to simmer.

This fish has just been blanched in boiling water, so there is no need to worry about the fish skin cracking or something.

After the fish is put into the pot, first boil the soup in the pot again on high heat, then turn to low heat and start to simmer slowly.

During the cooking process, do not cover the pot, because in this way, the fishy smell on the fish will evaporate with the water vapor.If the pot is covered, the fishy smell will liquefy with the water vapor and drip into the soup again, making the fish and sauce smell fishy.

In addition, not covering the pot can also accelerate the evaporation of water in the pot, making the soup thicker.

In the final analysis, this dish is actually a grilled dish. If more than half of the soup in the pot is boiled by grilling, the remaining soup will become thicker.

In this way, the effect of natural stickiness of the soup is formed.

During the whole cooking process, it is necessary to keep turning the pot to prevent the carp in the pot from sticking to the bottom of the pot.

After 10 minutes, the carp in the pot has completely turned into the ruddy and brown color of the sauce, and the soup has lost two-thirds.

Now the soup in the pot has thickened a lot, and because there is a lot of lard in it, the soup in the pot looks shiny and has a strong fragrance.

Occasionally, the pot will boil for a while, which will make the whole fish tremble.

The tenderness of the fish meat can be seen from here.

Although Xu Zhuo at the side had already fully understood the dish, he was still a little surprised when he saw it.

It is indeed an enduring dish in the capital area, and this dish does have its own charm.

At this time, the fish in the pot has become completely soft and rotten, so you can't use a spoon or a colander to serve it directly, but use a plate to scoop it out of the pot.

The so-called scooping requires quick eyesight and quick hands without fear of scalding, as well as certain skills.

I saw Ni Changye holding an oval fish plate, sticking it close to the bottom of the pot and inserting it under the body of the fish, holding the wok with the other hand and tilting it, the whole fish slid steadily into the plate.

There was a [-]-degree soup in the pot, but Ni Changye took the plate out of the pot unconsciously, then moved close to the prepared fish plate, and with a slight shake, the carp on the plate slipped into the fish plate.

He wiped his hands casually with a towel, then turned up the heat on the stove and continued to boil the remaining soup in the pot.

When the soup became more viscous, he evenly sprinkled a layer of ginger powder on the freshly prepared carp, then picked up the boiled sauce, and poured it evenly on the fish.

Immediately, the smell of fish, sauce, and ginger spread in the kitchen.

Xu Zhuo sniffed the scent, and was immediately shocked.

It's really fragrant!