In the early years of the Ming Dynasty, the common people loved to eat Nanjing plate duck, and the emperor also loved to eat it.

It is explained that Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang regards ducks as his life, one duck a day.

The imperial chefs in the court tried their best to develop a new way to eat duck to please Banzai, so they also developed two kinds of fork barbecue duck and stewed oven roast duck.

In the later stage of the development of fork barbecue duck, it is represented by "Quanjude", and the stewed oven roast duck is most famous for "cheap square".

Roast duck is made of fat grass duck as raw material, and the net weight requirement is about five catties. It has to go through several tedious processes to marinate and barbecue, because the method is complex and time-consuming, so the price is not low, but the profit is high.

Qi Ning is optimistic about profits, materials are not difficult to buy, difficult is to master the heat, Qi Ning's fellow scholar opened a farm in the mountains, and Qi Ning went to work and study during the holidays, because she did a good job of lo-mei, and she was also diligent, and everyone liked her. I also made it a few times with the master chef who made the roast duck, so it was no problem to make it.

As for the heat, the more you do it, the more you will gradually master it.

When the stove was finished at about noon, Qi Ning lit the fire and tried the flue, settled the money, wrapped a bag of lo-mei for Lu Laosan and the two apprentices, and invited them to come to eat roast duck at noon tomorrow, so that Tie Niu sent it away.

I sent Han Dong to invite Master Zhou and the officials of the yamen to come over at noon tomorrow to try the new, Qi Ning couldn't write the post, and she really couldn't take out the calligraphy, so she just went to talk about it.

In the afternoon, start to kill ducks, pluck their feathers, remove internal organs, and rinse them with water repeatedly. Cut off the head, flippers, wing tips, wings, duck gizzards, duck intestines, duck liver into the pot with cold water, add half a catty of rice wine, green onions, ginger and garlic slices to remove the fish, boil the pot for about five minutes and take it out. After the pot is heated, pour oil, put in Sichuan pepper, spices and chili pepper to stir-fry, then add green onions, ginger and garlic and stir-fry, after the fragrance and spicy taste come out, add an appropriate amount of water to the pot, bring to a boil over high heat, add soy sauce, a few spoons of sugar, and an appropriate amount of salt to boil over high heat and cook for about ten minutes.

Then put in the blanched duck wings, head, feet, and internal organs are all immersed in the marinade, turn to low heat after boiling, cover the pot and cook for about half an hour, and when the fire is extinguished, the boiled duck wings are soaked in the pot, just wait for tomorrow to take it out and eat, the longer the soaking time, the better it tastes. Because it's hot now, in order to prevent them from going bad, add a fire at night before going to bed.

Then he began to teach Zhao and Handong to make roast duck embryos, chili powder, minced garlic, salt, minced ginger and their own secret five-spice powder and put it in a basin, and mix it into juice with cold boiled water. Use a bamboo skewer to prick some holes in the duck's body for better flavoring. Pour some of the seasoned juice into the duck's belly. Place the duck in layers and pour in the rest of the marinade. Cover the marinade over the duck, cover it, put it in the shade and marinate.

In the evening, Qi Ning wrote three recipes for lo-mei, and asked Handong to send them to Wu and Xiao Wu early tomorrow morning.

When the ducks sent by Boss Yan were collected in the morning, the man who delivered the fruit firewood pulled a large cart and helped the iron oxen neatly stack them under the shed in the backyard.

Closing the door, Qi Ning took Zhao and Handong to take out the pickled duck and hang it in the shed to dry.

In the middle of the morning, the duck is brushed with honey and hung with an iron rod to the oven that has been lit with firewood and smoked, when the duck billet is just put into the furnace, the fire should burn more vigorously, with the increase of the temperature in the furnace, as well as the situation of the duck billet coloring, the fire should be gradually weakened, the furnace temperature must be controlled, the fire is too urgent and easy to paste, and the fire is small and baked out is not crispy.

After the duck blank is put into the oven, first make the back of the duck body to the fire, and roast about a cup of tea. When the back is roasted until orange, turn over the duck and roast it for half a cup of tea. When the color of the back and chest is the same, pick up the duck with a rod, and pick up the crotch near the fire to color the legs, and then hang the duck back into the furnace after the color is even. When the white and oily soup overflows from the knife edge of the duck body, pick up the duck and pick the crotch again to find the color, and then it can be baked.

Because these ducks have not eaten feed, they have been raised for a long time and the meat is hard, and it takes more than half an hour to be fully cooked after repeated operations. When the time was almost up, Qi Ning hooked one out and poured out the soup in the duck cavity to observe. When the soup is pink, it means that the duck is ripe, and the soup that is poured out is light white with a certain amount of oil, indicating that the duck is ten ripe. If the soup is milky white and the soup is too oily, it means that the duck has been overcooked. After the duck is baked, it should be brushed with a layer of sesame oil while it is hot to increase the brightness of the leather surface. It can also remove soot and add fragrance.

Qi Ning explained carefully while operating. Because it was the first time I did it, I roasted less than eight of them in one oven today.

Zhao and Han Dong had already seen it, and Han Dong looked at Qi Ning with admiration: "Girl, is there anything in this world that you can't do?" ”

"It's a pity that I'm not a man, or I'll marry us Handong." Qi Ning smiled and deliberately wiped Han Dong's face with his greasy hands.

"Girl." Han Dong hurriedly wiped his face and said angrily.

"Okay, I'm going to open the door to welcome the guests we invited today, you can cook the lotus leaf cake according to what I told yesterday, make a stewed lotus root, mix it with shredded pickles, and put the shredded green onion and noodle sauce on a small plate."

Zhao and Han Dong hurriedly agreed to work, the shop had already been cleaned by Tie Niu, Qi Ning opened the door of the shop, washed the tea set and waited for Master Zhou: "Tie Niu, you didn't forget to call Wang Zhutou yesterday, right?" ”

"I went to talk last night, and Wang Zhutou agreed and didn't speak, should he come?" Tie Niu was particularly scared of the king's head, and every time he saw him, Tie Niu didn't dare to talk much.

Just as he was saying this, Master Zhou took the lead, followed by a group of people and entered the door: "Qi girl, what is delicious?" You can smell the fragrance from a long distance. ”

"Master Zhou, Brother Wang...... You're all here, please take a seat. Qi Ning greeted them one by one. More than a dozen of them came today, and it is estimated that all those who are not on duty have come. It took two tables before I sat down.

"That's right, Miss Qi, don't sell it, talk about it quickly. The scent hooked out all the cravings in my stomach. A familiar official asked with a smile.

"Sit down, and the Iron Ox will bring six ducks." After Qi Ning finished speaking, he went to the shelf and served side dishes and shredded green onions on a small plate, and the lotus leaf cakes were placed on the table again and again, jokingly: "I made a fresh food, you will help me taste it later, if it is delicious or not, you must tell the truth, don't say kind words, or I won't invite you first if there is something delicious in the future." ”

Tie Niu and Han Dong brought six ducks from the back and sent them over, three of them were placed on a table, Qi Ning cut them thinly with a knife, and made a demonstration: "This is called roast duck, you can eat it directly, you can also roll it in a lotus leaf cake or sandwich it in a hollow sesame baked cake to eat, and add shredded green onions and sweet noodle sauce according to personal preferences." If you like spicy food, you can put garlic or chili oil on it. If you like sweetness, you can add sugar to eat, and you can also sandwich cucumber strips and green radish strips to eat, clear your mouth and relieve greasy. There are no cucumbers and turnips today, so you will eat them first. Qi Ning handed the wrapped one in his hand to Master Zhou, and others were busy learning Qi Ning's wrapping method to operate.

Qi Ning handed the sliced duck bones to Han Dong and asked her to add winter melon to make soup later: "Wait for you to taste this duck rack winter melon soup, it has a different flavor." ”

"Qi girl is really ingenious, I have eaten a lot of this duck, and the first time I tasted it after roasting, it was much better than stewed soup." After Master Zhou finished eating what he was holding, he continued to roll up and said to the happy Wang Zhutou.

Wang Zhutou nodded: "It's really delicious." ”

The rest of the crowd also shouted a mouthful of meat to praise the deliciousness.

The Lu brothers also came with two people, Qi Ning and Tie Niu enthusiastically let them sit at another table, and also served them roast duck and side dishes, so that Tie Niu learned to cut them and serve them to eat.

"Miss Qi, how much are you going to sell this duck?" A slightly older official swallowed the food in his mouth and asked.

"This duck looks simple, but it takes a day and a night to get better, I plan to sell it for three hundred wen, what do you think?"

"So expensive!" The official who asked just now was a little surprised: "A live duck is only about 100 yuan." ”

"What do you know, it's not just a day and a night's work, but also labor and materials, it's not expensive." Wang Zhutou suddenly burst out.

"It's really not expensive, if you go to another restaurant, I'm afraid it won't cost more than one or two silver." Master Zhou nodded approvingly.

"Yes, let's not talk about the waste firewood, it's just that I secretly made it with good things, and the cost is not low." Qi Ning filled them with wine next to each other.

"Yes, yes, I'm a little reckless, girl, don't be surprised." The older official blushed and apologized, and the seven or eight members of his family pointed to him for two taels of silver a month to live, and the local magistrate was barely a clean official, and his rule was strict, so they didn't have much extra oil and water.

"It's okay, uncle is usually busy with official business and can't take care of these trivial things, I don't know if it's supposed to be." Qi Ning was round and changed a cup of tea for him.

"Everyone has seen it, you say it's delicious, I'm relieved, tomorrow my roast duck restaurant will be officially opened, and then I will rely on everyone to take care of me." Qi Ning made a blessing to these people.

A black and thin official who sent Wang Zhutou back last time smiled and said, "I don't know about others, but I will definitely come often." When I have a day off, I will bring my son to eat. ”

A servant beside him said disdainfully: "As long as you have a son, no matter what you eat, you can't forget it, I hope he won't throw you on the wall when he marries a daughter-in-law in the future." ”

The crowd burst into laughter.