What is the origin and history of tofu?

Before the liberation, near Pengjiaqiao in Guiyang, there lived an old couple surnamed Zhang, who made a living by selling roasted tofu on the street. During the period when the Japanese planes bombed Guiyang, people in the city went to Pengjiaqiao in the suburbs to avoid planes, and people often went to Lao Zhang's house to buy food, and the couple did not have time to cook and sell vegetables, so they roasted their own tofu and sold it, and they ate it with relish. Lao Zhang's tofu fruit is cheap and good, the taste is good, come here to buy tofu fruit to the young people who look like students, buy a few pieces of tofu fruit, chat while eating, slowly there are a few pairs of mutual affection, then take Lao Zhang's tofu stall as a date place, often come here to eat tofu fruit, and then really talk about love, for a while, it has become a good story in the streets of old Guiyang City.

Lao Zhang's tofu stall became famous because of this, and the roasted tofu has since had a romantic name - love tofu fruit.

Tofu, which is tender and nutritious, is a delicacy in people's daily meals and is quite popular among people. Everyone knows that tofu is delicious. But the origin of tofu may not be known to everyone According to the record of "Tianlu Zhiyu":

Tofu, made by Liu An, the king of Huainan, is also known as Li Qi. "Liu An is the grandson of Liu Bang of the Western Han Dynasty. He summarized the methods of making tofu by the working people in Huainan (now Anhui, Jiangxi, Zhejiang, etc.) and popularized it.

Therefore, it can be said that tofu was produced at least in the Western Han Dynasty in China.

The great poet Lu You of the Song Dynasty said: "Wipe the plate to advance the food, wash the kettle and cook Li Qi". The kettle is the pot.

Li Qi is also known as tofu. It can be seen that tofu was already a very popular food in the Song Dynasty, otherwise how could it enter the pen of the great poet Lu You? The Ming scholar Li Shizhen's "Compendium of Materia Medica" summarized the methods of making tofu in great detail, which is very close to the process of artificial tofu today.

It can be seen that tofu originated in China, and it has a history of more than 2,000 years since Liu An made tofu. To this day, tofu is still the main nutritious food for the people of our country, especially the people in the north, in winter.

The moisture content of dried tofu is 40%-50% of that of tofu. The production method is as follows: (1) Preparation.

3 kg of fine soybeans, 600 grams of refined salt, 250 grams of soy sauce, 15 grams of cinnamon, 25 grams of diced ginger, 15 grams of chives, 10 grams of monosodium glutamate. (2) Refining. Wash the soybeans first, soak them in water for a day and night, then grind them into a pulp, filter the residue and set aside.

3) Boil the pulp. After the ground raw soybean milk is boiled in the pot, 20%-25% water is added to reduce the concentration of soybean milk and slow down the speed of doubt, so that the formation of protein coagulation network is slowed down, and the wrapping of water and soluble matter is reduced, so as to facilitate the smooth discharge of water during pressing. (4) Coagulation.

When the slurry temperature drops to 8 0 -90, the slurry can be spotted with brine. Attention should be paid to uniformity when dispensing the slurry, and it should be stirred frequently, but it should be prevented from stirring. When the pulp appears sesame-sized particles, stop the point, cover the lid for about 30-40 minutes, and when the pulp temperature drops to about 70 C, the bag is loaded.

5) Brainstroke. Before wrapping, the tofu should be crushed, which is not only conducive to breaking the network to release the water, but also can make the tofu brain evenly spread on the cloth, and the quality of the product is tight, which can avoid uneven thickness and more gaps. (6) Packing.

First spread the cloth on the grid (the grid on the board is formulated according to the size of the dried tofu required), and then add the tofu brain to the cloth, so that a layer of tofu brain is added to the cloth, the tofu brain should be evenly paved, a few millimeters higher than the grid, the quantity should be determined according to the thickness of the dried tofu, but the thickness of each batch should be consistent. Then wrap the cloth tightly, press and mold, remove the wrapping cloth after 1 hour, use a knife to cut the dried tofu according to the grid print, soak the bag in clean water for about 30 minutes, and then take it out. (7) Soaking.

First, put 500 grams of refined salt in 3 kg of water and stir well, then put the cooled dried bean curd in the dry salt water tank, soak for half a day, then remove and drain the water. Take 7 kilograms of water and pour it into the pot, put 100 grams of refined salt, diced ginger, cinnamon (packed in a gauze bag), soy sauce, chives, and monosodium glutamate to make brine. (8) Cook dry.

Return the made brine to the pot and boil it, add the dried beans, cook for about 30 minutes, take a dried bean curd and observe, if the color is brown and red, the taste is fragrant, you can take it out.

Tofu is a nutritious and time-honored ingredient, and the public's love for tofu has promoted the progress and development of the tofu making process. The main production process of tofu is pulping, that is, making soybeans into soybean milk; The second is coagulation, that is, soybean milk is coagulated into a gel containing a large amount of water under the combined action of heat and coagulant, that is, tofu.

Tofu originated in the Western Han Dynasty of China. Tofu has a long history of existence, and according to legend, it was invented in 164 BC by Liu An, the king of Huainan, the grandson of Liu Bang, the ancestor of the Han dynasty of China. When Liu An burned medicine and alchemy on Bagong Mountain at the junction of Shou County and Huainan in Anhui Province, he accidentally used gypsum to order bean juice to invent tofu.

It was not until the Song Dynasty that tofu became an important food. The Southern Song Dynasty poet Lu You recorded that Su Dongpo liked to eat candied tofu gluten; Wu Zimu's "Dream Lianglu" records that the wine shop in Lin'an, the capital, sells tofu and fried tofu. Tofu was introduced to Korea during the Song Dynasty and to Europe, Africa and North America in the early 19th century.

Nowadays, tofu has become one of the main foods in Vietnam, Thailand, South Korea, Japan and other countries.

The history of the development of tofu:Our country is the birthplace of tofu. According to legend, Liu An, the king of Huainan.

177-122 B.C.), his mother liked to eat soybeans, and once his mother couldn't eat whole soybeans due to illness, Liu An asked someone to grind soybeans into flour, afraid that the flour would be too dry, so he rushed into some water to boil soymilk.

I was afraid that the taste would be light, so I put some salt and brine, and it turned out to be a lumpy thing, that is, tofu flowers.

How to make tofu:There are many records in some ancient books after the Ming Dynasty. Li Shizhen's "Compendium of Materia Medica".

The rapid preparation method of tofu and the use of coagulant are elaborated: "The method of tofu can be used for black beans, yellow beans, white beans, mung beans and the like. Method: water immersion, crushing, slag removal, cooking, salt marinade or alum juice or sour vinegar lake, and the kettle income.

Molding is to put the solidified tofu brain.

Put it in a specific mold, apply a certain pressure, and squeeze out the excess yellow syrup, so that the tofu brain is densely combined to become a certain water content.

and elastic and resilient tofu, the pressure exerted by different products varies.

The above content reference: Encyclopedia - Tofu.