On winter nights, under the street lamp poles at the corners of the streets and alleys, there are many burdens of liquor. If you are in the countryside where you are singing a big opera and playing dragon lanterns, there will always be a lantern on the burden of winemaking, and you will sway with the burden. The owner of the sake brewing burden is mostly an old man with a rickety waist and an old velvet hat. At one end of the burden was a stove and pot, and at the other end was a wine-making bowl and bowls and basins. The night wind blew, and the lanterns and fires flickered, and the dead leaves danced and swirled at the feet of the burden. "Down—wine-brewing-wow-" The old man's voice was blocked and hoarse, but he had the strength to penetrate the vicissitudes of the world in accordance with the winter night and the wind and candle of life...... This kind of wine-brewing burden has been laid out in Feng Zikai's comics with thick black lines, and the strong flavor of life is full of paper.

In addition to the burden of sake, there is also a type of vendor, who carries crockpots full of sweet sake, and walks the streets and alleys to sell them. You can also buy sake brew in the vegetable market, and sometimes you can buy "shuizi" - a small balls slightly larger than soybeans made of glutinous rice flour, which are first placed in boiling water, rolled twice, and then scooped into a spoonful of sake brewed and put in. The sparkling glutinous rice wine, the round and jade grains of water, dotted with dots of yellow osmanthus flowers, wafts with the hot air and spreads a moving mellow fragrance. Therefore, the burden of liquor brewing on the streets of Wuhu beckoned people, and what they shouted was: "Sell-"

In the early years, many families made their own sake. Making wine is not a technical job, and most old and young women do. During the New Year's holidays, or when there is a mother at home, it has almost become a custom to make a little wine. Ask others for a good koji to make an introduction, ask about the ratio of koji and glutinous rice, then wash and steam the glutinous rice, mix in the koji pounded into powder when it is half warm and half cool, put it in a jar, wipe it flat all around, only leave a cone-shaped hole in the middle, and pour a little warm boiled water on it. In winter, the outside of the jar must be covered with a quilt to keep warm. After a few days of waiting, as the fermentation progresses, an enticing sweet fragrance emanates uncontrollably, and the hole in the middle is filled with clear juice, reflecting the glaze of the stoneware of the bowl with a wet glow...... This is the sweet wine, taste it, it is so mellow. The more the wine seeped out, the last big clump of tangled cake was floating in the wine. The home-brewed sake is delicious and juicy, and it is intoxicating. Many people who are not good drinkers pour this sweet wine into the bottle and use it as a drink, even if they are not on the New Year's Day, they can drink themselves and enjoy themselves, and go into the slightly drunk with red ears to find a pleasure of fluttering clothes.

Cut the rice cake into thin slices, boil it in a pot of boiling water until soft, and then dig a large spoonful of sake brew with juice and water to put it in, which is the rice cake under the sweet wine. There are also sweet wine dumplings, sweet wine beaten eggs - that is, sweet wine and eggs. Boil the red adzuki beans in water, brew them in sweet wine, boil, beat in eggs, and add brown sugar to taste after the eggs are solidified. The wine is boiled, poured in the egg mixture, added sugar, and slightly thickened, that is, it becomes egg drop liqueur...... In retrospect, it was all a nostalgic breakfast or a late-night snack. In addition, the liquor can also be used to spoil fish, bad pig intestines, bad chickens and ducks, and it is easy to say that it has a deep red and hearty color, and it is not necessary to say that it is mellow and clear. If it is steamed in the rice pot, the lid of the pot is not lifted, and the aroma of wine and meat surrounds it early, and it has not been served on the table, and it has been brewed in a room.

In recent years, there has been a chilled liquor on the streets in summer, usually mixed with iced red bean paste or iced date soup, and sometimes, there are several pieces of orange-red peeled pumpkin, which brings out a slightly sour flavor in sweetness, and then sprinkled with a little sugar osmanthus, the taste is light and fragrant. Also, peel the old pumpkin, cut it into square pieces, or cut it into small orange balls, steam it in a drawer, take it out and cool it, put it in wine, and sprinkle it with sugar osmanthus after chilling, which is naturally another flavor. In the hot summer, if you have just eaten something thick, drink a bowl of chilled wine, or eat a few pieces of glutinous soft and sweet pumpkin, the bottom of your heart will be stained by layers of sweetness.

At the end of autumn in the south of the Yangtze River, the original dense green lotus leaves in the ditch of Tanggang in the water town of the polder area have all withered and shrunk, but the residual lotus has been left to fatten the stems, and in the soil under their roots at the bottom of the water, it is full of strong and medium-hole old lotus roots, just like beautiful poems sleeping in the poetry collection. Lotus root, which can be used as a vegetable, can also be used as a substitute for grain and fruit, both raw and cooked, meat and vegetarian can be, sweet or salty, and there are many ways to eat. Wang Shixiong of the Qing Dynasty said in "Suixingju Diet Recipe": "The lotus root is good for fat and white." Raw and cooked are fresh and tender, and the cooks should be strong and old. Use the clay pot mulberry firewood to simmer very badly, refine the white honey, collect the dry food, and nourish the heart and spleen the most. ”

In the early to mid-sixties of the twentieth century, in the streets and alleys of my hometown county, you could often see hawkers carrying the burden of a stove and selling lotus root porridge. As they walked, they banged on bamboo sticks, selling them along the street, stopping as they went, and on the stove they picked was a copper pot as big as a medium drum, and the pot was simmering with red lotus root porridge. Bang, Bang, Bang...... "Sell-hot lotus porridge-" Under the autumn wind and falling leaves, there seems to be a sad meaning in the tone. Sometimes it's a late-night pick, with a wind lamp from that era, a glass square cover, and a cotton yarn twist soaked in kerosene, and a small red bucket filled with water, soaked in a pile of small blue porcelain bowls...... The white steaming heat coming out of the stove, the aroma is fragrant, accompanied by the red fire, the inside and outside of the pot are red, which can bring hot warmth to people who walk at night.

Twenty years ago, I was transferred to the newspaper office, and because I was single, I often solved my belly problem everywhere in the morning, and gradually became familiar with some street food. At that time, there was an old man surnamed Zhu who specialized in selling copper pot lotus root porridge at the north gate, and people called Zhu Daddy. Early every morning, Daddy Zhu set up a huge copper pot, burned the stove with chopping wood, and boiled porridge. Glutinous rice plus peeled lotus, put enough water at a time, no more continuum in the middle, change to low heat and simmer slowly after the fire boils.

Boiled until it was viscous, and the pot was moved to a fixed stove on the cart, which also had firewood burning, and several low stools were stacked on top of the cart. Daddy Zhu pushed the car to the north gate to sell it. On the way, he would sometimes stop and unhurriedly knock on the bang to attract customers. The lotus root in the copper pot is powdery and sweet, and the porridge is glutinous and sweet. For five cents, you can ask for a bowl of porridge with lotus root slices, or you can point to the whole section of lotus root and let it be scooped up, put it on a plate and cut a few slices. In the afternoons and evenings of winter, some people who come out of the bathhouse, with wet hair, walk to Daddy Zhu's stall and ask for a bowl of lotus root porridge and eat deliciously.

The big copper kettle used to make lotus seed porridge looks like it is also antique-level, made of copper, the body frame is not much smaller than the copper pot for cooking lotus root porridge, and the charcoal fire in the heart of the pot can boil the water to more than 150 degrees, and the lotus seed powder can be washed into a paste, and it is fragrant, sweet and smooth when sucked up. The upper and lower parts of the copper kettle each have a circle of copper ornament patterns, the top of the body of the pot rolls a copper dragon, the dragon head has been wound to the spout, the handle is also composed of a dragon, the dragon whiskers, dragon claws, dragon scales are vividly recognizable. The two dragon whiskers sticking out of the dragon's beak, with two red pompoms at the tip, trembled as the big master poured the pot for water.

This huge copper kettle is also placed on the shelf car, the big master holds the bowl in one hand, lifts the pot with the other, the spout tilts downward, and a stream of boiling water draws a silver arc into the bowl. In the bowl, sometimes lotus seed powder, sometimes sifted burnt flour, with brown sugar, white sugar, sesame seeds, walnut kernels, sugar osmanthus and green silk roses, a hot bowl, sweet and mellow, rich taste. In some seasons, this dragon head big copper kettle also brews lotus root powder and a kind of almond powder, the water is full of powder, the lotus root powder is clear, the almond pink is long yellow, the texture is delicate, and it makes people feel excited.