The first is to make rice dumplings.
Jiangning is going to make two kinds of rice dumplings, one is the southern alkaline rice dumpling, and the other is the local bacon rice dumpling.
Southern alkaline rice dumplings use brown leopard-print bamboo leaves.
The leaves are larger and sturdier.
They fall off from the roots after the bamboo shoots grow into bamboo.
There were a lot of bamboos on the nearby mountains, so Jiang Ning picked some back up when he went out.
Soak in water first, then clean them one by one.
The glutinous rice needed for the rice dumplings was naturally harvested by Jiang Ning from the Lingbao Space.
The glutinous rice is one grain after another, round and crystal clear.
Make it overnight and soak in cold water.
After soaking for a long time, the glutinous rice has absorbed water, become plump and plump, and its color has become off-white.
After pouring out the excess water, you can add alkali powder.
However, there were very few alkali powders in this era, and more alkali blocks were used.
Jiang Ning smashed the alkali block into small shapes and put it into a small bowl.
Water is added and the alkali block quickly begins to melt.
Then add the melted alkaline water to the glutinous rice according to the proportion of glutinous rice.
Mix the glutinous rice and reduced water with your hands until evenly mixed.
The alkaline water in the rice dumplings can promote the gelatinization of starch in the glutinous rice, making the taste softer, glutinous and elastic, and also making the rice dumplings firmer.
After a while.
After being exposed to alkaline water, the glutinous rice will lose its off-white color and become slightly yellow.
Just like that, the glutinous rice is ready.
Jiang Ning picked up the washed bamboo leaves, overlapped them, and placed them in the palm of his hand.
The other hand holds the other end of the bamboo leaf.
Then he turned his wrist slightly, and an inverted cone shape appeared.
Next, you can put the glutinous rice into the bamboo leaf cone.
Press carefully and there should be no hollow areas inside.
The glutinous rice should not be too full, otherwise the rice will fall out later.
Next step.
That is to press down the overlapping leaves to seal the cone shape.
In the process of making zongzi, this step is the most difficult.
The key to making beautiful four-cornered rice dumplings lies in this step.
For Jiang Ning, it was just a piece of cake.
After folding the bamboo leaves, she pressed the thumb of her right hand and turned her left hand, and a beautiful triangle appeared at the top.
Finally, take a piece of cotton thread and tie it tightly in a circle.
A beautiful water-reduced rice dumpling is finished.
Nice-looking rice dumplings with four corners can stand firmly on a horizontal surface.
And no matter which angle you look at it, it looks like three corners connected to form a standard isosceles triangle.
What Jiang Ning did was so perfect.
She made more than thirty lye rice dumplings in one go and used up all the bamboo leaves she prepared.
Immediately afterwards.
It’s time to start making bacon rice dumplings.
This time, Jiang Ning no longer used brown leopard-print leaves, but green fresh raw rice dumpling leaves.
Just soak it in water and wash it clean.
Stack the two long pieces together to increase the width and make the rice dumpling larger.
The glutinous rice required for bacon rice dumplings does not need to be added with alkaline water, as long as it is simply soaked in water.
The method of making rice dumplings is no longer the previous conical and four-cornered rice dumplings.
Rather, it is a round bundling method.
First add glutinous rice to the raw rice dumpling leaves, and then place a piece of fat and thin bacon in the center.
Then add some glutinous rice to cover the bacon.
Fold the front and back ends of the bamboo leaves in half and cover them from left to right, just like wrapping a small pillow, and the round bacon rice dumplings are formed.
Then use white cotton rope to wrap the rice dumplings together in circles.
Perfect~
This method of making rice dumplings is simpler and more convenient, and you can learn it by just watching it a few times.
Jiangning's package was faster.
After a while, more than thirty large meat dumplings were completed.
Next is boiling water.
Divide into two pots.
Cook rice dumplings with alkaline water in one pot and rice dumplings with bacon in one pot.
As long as you don't boil the water dry, you can have a delicious meal.
Zongzi can also contain many, many other things and add them inside.
For example, salted egg yolk, pork belly, red bean paste...
Jiang Ning doesn't have enough time, otherwise he would like to do something.
While cooking rice dumplings, Jiang Ning was already busy making Qingtuan balls.
The most important raw material of Qingtuan is mugwort.
Mugwort is a seasonal weed that is only available during the Qingming Festival.
Mugwort grows quite distinctively. When viewed from the front, the leaves are green, but when viewed from the back, there is a layer of silver reflection.
Moreover, mugwort also has a special smell, making it a wild vegetable that is hard to mistake.
The mugwort in Jiangning is not picked from the mountains.
Instead, they dug up some seedlings, planted them in the Lingbao space, and carried out large-scale cultivation and propagation before they became numerous.
The mugwort taken out from Lingbao Space is clean and does not even need to be washed.
Put the clean mugwort into hot water and bring to a boil over high heat.
After blanching, take the mugwort out of the water and squeeze out the water.
Mugwort that originally looked like a lot will turn into clumps.
The next step is to crush the mugwort, preferably into a puree.
There is no modern machine in Jiangning, so I use a knife to cut the mugwort into powder, and then chop it carefully.
Purely manual operation.
Now Qin Jiulie is not here, and there is no one to help. She can only keep working hard.
After the mugwort puree is ready, you can mix it with the glutinous rice.
Add water and seasoning.
Knead into a green dough.
To make green dough balls, you don't need to knead the dough like you do for steamed buns and steamed buns. You just need to form a ball, beat it a few times to make sure it won't fall apart, and then you can take shape.
Then divide the large ball of dough into small pieces of even size, about 40g.
Cover the small dough with a damp white cloth.
And then.
These are two fillings that Jiang Ning had prepared long ago.
One is winter bamboo shoots and pickled vegetables, a salty green dumpling.
This is a very common way of eating among people in areas around Shanghai.
Since Grandma Qin likes to eat prunes and dried bamboo shoots, she will also like to eat winter bamboo shoots and pickled vegetables.
Another kind is sesame filling.
Blanch the sesame seeds, then crush them, add sugar, and stir together to form a sweet green dough.
After the green dough is cooked, the white sugar inside will melt, and the sesame seeds will be wrapped in the shiny sugar juice, and the fragrance of the sesame seeds will be perfectly integrated into it.
It can be said that it is suitable for all ages, and both men and women like it.
Making green dumplings is also simpler than making steamed buns. Flatten the dough into a round shape, put the filling in the middle, and then wrap it up.
It’s the same method as making glutinous rice balls.
Put it in the palm of both hands, rub it from left to right, and form it into a ball. It's done easily~.
One by one, oval-shaped green balls appeared from Jiang Ning's nimble hands like magic.
After a while.
It's a full table.
After finishing these, the rice dumplings are cooked and can be taken out from the large iron pot and set aside to cool.
Immediately afterwards.
Just steam the green dumplings over hot water.
On this day, Jiang Ning was busy from noon until eight or nine o'clock in the evening, and there was a fire burning in the small kitchen.
That slender figure has been busy all the time.
Even the green dumplings were steamed in the end.
Jiang Ning still couldn't stop, and there was an extremely important step left -
