Ya'an Gongjiao Fish

When people mention Ya'an, the first thing that comes to mind is probably the great earthquake that happened in Ya'an. In fact, some of Ya'an's delicacies are also quite famous, and there are many tourist attractions in Ya'an that are fascinating. Ya'an's tribute pepper fish is a relatively famous fish. The reason why it is called the public transportation fish is because it was once offered as a tribute to the royal family. So how is Ya'an's tribute pepper fish made? Let me introduce

Ingredients: one large catfish (or Guizhou fish), a large amount of Sichuan peppercorns, ginger, garlic, scallion whites, Hangzhou peppercorns, tomatoes, cooking wine, salt, chicken powder, sugar, cooking oil, and some water (bone broth is best)

Dipping sauce: chopped coriander, chopped chili pepper, chopped patchouli, chopped spicy black beans

Production steps:

1. Remove the internal organs of catfish (or Guizhou fish), rinse it repeatedly, cut it into small pieces, add a little salt, cooking wine and ginger slices and marinate for about half an hour, rinse off the debris after boiling water and set aside (this step is critical, because catfish (or Guizhou fish) has a strong fishy smell and a lot of mucus, this step can be well removed and cleaned).

2. Heat a proper amount of oil in a wok and pour in 2/3 of the peppercorns to stir-fry until they bring out the numbing aroma.

3. Add ginger slices, garlic slices, scallion segments, and Hangzhou pepper segments and stir-fry until fragrant.

4. Add enough water to cover all the fish pieces (bone soup will make it more delicious), bring to a boil over high heat, pour in the remaining Sichuan peppercorns, turn to low heat to bring out the aroma of the Sichuan peppercorns, add salt, chicken essence and a little sugar to adjust the taste.

5. Put the fish head in and cook for a while first, then put the fish pieces in one by one and cook until done.

Top Ten Specialties of Ya'an

1. Elegant fish

It is one of Ya'an's famous specialties and is a species unique to the mountainous areas of the Central Asian plateau. It is also known as "Bingxun fish". It is produced in Zhougong River of Qingyi River (Ya'an section), so it is called Ya fish. The fish is shaped like a carp but has scales as fine as trout. It has a large body and tender meat. Casserole Ya fish is a local specialty. According to legend, during the Qing Dynasty, the meat was presented to Empress Dowager Cixi, who praised it as "the meat of dragon and phoenix."

2. Mengshan Tea

Mengshan tea has been famous since it was presented as tribute in the Tang Dynasty. Fairy tea and tribute tea have been treasures of my country's famous teas throughout the ages. There are many varieties of Mengshan tea, each with its own characteristics. There are famous brands of tea such as Huangya, Shihua, Ganlu, Wanye, Yinye and Yuye Changchun, which have entered the international market and are very popular. "Emei Maofeng" is a famous tea produced in Fengming Township, Ya'an. It won the gold medal at the 1985 High-Quality Food Selection Expo. Since then, the fragrance of "Emei Maofeng" tea has spread overseas.

3. Mengding Mountain Tea

The geographical scope includes 20 towns including Mengdingshan Town, Mingshan County, Sichuan Province, and two towns, Bifengxia Town and Longxi Township, located in Mengshan, Yucheng District, Ya'an.

The specific quality raw materials are collected from the hometown of fairy tea - single buds in the early spring before the spring equinox in Mengding Mountain area of ​​Mingshan County, Ya'an, Sichuan, due to the three major characteristics of the tea area: frequent rain, fog and clouds. In this unique natural environment, tea trees grow luxuriantly, the tea buds are fresh and tender, and they last forever. They are refined through historical traditional handcrafts, thus forming the unique quality of this top-grade Mengding Huangya. The tea buds are uniform in shape, flat and straight, with a yellow and moist color, and all the hairs are exposed; the tea soup is bright yellow and translucent, sweet, fragrant, fresh, mellow and refreshing; the leaf bottom is all tender yellow.

Cultural allusion: "The Book of Documents" says, "Cai Meng's trip to Ping is to Mengshan, which is in Yazhou. All Shu tea comes from here." Tea trees were planted on Mengding as early as the Ganlu period of the Western Han Dynasty (53 BC). Wu Lizhen, a county resident, personally planted seven "spiritual tea seeds among the five peaks. They were less than a foot high, immortal, and very different from ordinary ones." This is the earliest written record of artificial tea cultivation in my country.