Abstract
We all enjoy eating food naturally. For decades, many experts and scholars have studied the history of Chinese food and yielded fruitful results. They have provided new perspectives and fresh ideas for the development of modern food technology. In this chapter, the author focuses on his professional field by studying the history of science and technology and core issues based on historical materials and deductive logic on food.
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Notes
- 1.
The origin of agriculture theory: at present, in addition to the theory that the pressure of population leads to agricultural development, there are other academic opinions challenging this view.
- 2.
In Cui Shi’s Zhenglun (Political view): “Official of a hundred Li is appointed to shoulder the responsibility of the feudal princes but only get salary of people who guard the prison. Take one month of his salary for example: his January salary was twenty hu of millet and two thousand qian. Although the official wanted to be frugal, he still had one servant. Even though he didn’t have any servant, he had guests who cost a lot of money. Thousands for guests, meat for five hundred, woods, coal, and pickled vegetables another five hundred. Two people ate six hu of millet and the rest for the horse. There was no money left for winter and summer clothes and quilt, ceremonies in four seasons and wine for guests, not to mention he had parents, wife and son to support.”
- 3.
In fact, the author of Tiao Ding Ji is actually not clear. In 1977, Mr. Zhang Yannian began to use the manuscript of Tiao Ding Ji as supplementary materials in cooking teaching after he found it from the Shanben section of Bei**g Library. Mr. Zhang made great contributions by checking the details in the book before it was reprinted by Zhongzhou ancient books publishing house, making this precious historical material come to light again. According to Mr. Zhang, Tiao Ding Ji was compiled by Tong Yuejian, and the following reasons in the preface of the book are listed: ① the author of the chapter of alcohol was Tong Yuejian; ② according to the record of Yangzhou barge, Tong lived in Gengzi Street in Yangzhou to collect the details of cuisines. But the original preface of the manuscript of Tiao Ding Ji was Cheng Duolu, who was one of the three great persons in Jilin province in the late period of the Qing dynasty. He wrote this book at the invitation of his friend Jianzhai in **ing of Shandong province a year before his death, in 1928, at a place named Shisan Guhuai in Bei**g, showing how much importance he attached. In his late years, Cheng Duolu served as the vice curator of Bei**g Library and the director of the Audit Department of Ministry of Education of the Republic of China; as a result, it’s reasonable and authentic for Tiao Ding Ji to reappear here. The preface clearly states that “all ten volumes of the book, without the author’s name, are collected from an old book.” Mr. Jianzhai, the organizer of the Beitu and the inviter, and Mr. Cheng Duolu, the writer of the preface, are both from the north. Their interests in the recipe full of southern Shaoxing dialect indicate the integration of culture and their extensive knowledge. As a result, they will not neglect the evidence in Mr. Zhang Yannian’s preliminary research. After all, Tiao Ding Ji is more like a collection of notes of other people. So, it’s possible that Tong Yuejian only write the chapter of the alcohol, which is the most unique and outstanding chapter in the whole book. The author of this chapter could be the expert in alcohol but not necessarily the expert in cooking at the same time.
- 4.
The sauce was mentioned in the following literature: Zhouli-Tiangong-Shanfu: “the gift of the emperor was twenty jars of sauce.” Shuowen-Youbu: “the Chinese character of Sauce is composed of meat pastes and alcohol.” Making food in four seasons, the 936th volume of Tai** Yulan: “the small fish in the county of Pi has yellow scale and red tail. Catch the fish out of the rice field and make sauce out of it.” Hai-the food and drinks, the 146th volume of Beitang Shuchao: “the sauce of the side of centipedes” and “the sauce of soft interior of crab”; Liji-Neize: “the fish eggs can be made into sauce.”
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Fang, Y. (2021). Ancient Chinese Food Technology and Food Materials. In: Jiang, X. (eds) A New Phase of Systematic Development of Scientific Theories in China. History of Science and Technology in China. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7844-1_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7844-1_5
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