In ancient times, there was a chain of contempt for eating. literati regarded "clear offerings" as elegant, and vegetarian food became a fashion. Yuan Mei said: "There are meat and vegetables in dishes, just as clothes have inside and outside. Rich people prefer vegetables more than meat." Lu You advocates vegetarian health preservation, and also uses vegetarian food to show off his wealth."Pine cinnamon soft rice is cooked with jade grains, and self-made silver eggplant with acid sauce." Huang Tingjian has a "Poetry on Stopping Killing", which says that being vegetarian means mercy and directly elevates the lifestyle to the spiritual level.

I am not sure about other things about vegetarian food, but I am sure that eating in Hangzhou can be beautiful.

View of Hangzhou Leifeng Tower in Jingci Temple

Therefore, even if there is no Yan Ruyu, as long as there is a scattered landscape of pavilions and terraces, Hangzhou's sense of "retreat" in the human realm will make "eminent monks and savages move." From the courtyard outside the window to the calamus on the desk, the emotion becomes naturally elegant. With the atmosphere set off here, it is suitable for a vegetarian diet.

Hangzhou's Jingci Temple is surrounded by green bushes and wooden tiles, and you can overlook the different Leifeng Pagoda. There are many delicious vegetarian restaurants. For me, eating in temples in Hangzhou has a unique flavor of Song Dynasty. Song people especially loved beauty. Beautiful scenery, beautiful utensils and beautiful calligraphy and painting were especially important to a meal. If your stomach is full, your heart must be full.

Recently, I was watching the online exhibition of the Forbidden City in Hong Kong. There is an exhibition hall called "Concrete for Tools". In it, there are only more than 100 pieces of Ru porcelain handed down from the Northern Song Dynasty. The white porcelain baby pillow is the Ding kiln of the Northern Song Dynasty and can be regarded as the most famous ceramic collection in the Forbidden City. It is extremely rare for people of its kind to be passed down from generation to generation, and we have all seen it when eating vegetarian food in Suchun Zhai.

White porcelain baby pillow

"Suchun Zhai", a time-honored vegetarian restaurant that many old Hangzhou people have dreamed of, is now reborn in Jingci Temple, but it has captured many young vegans who worship the past. The Song Dynasty antiques in the museum were reproduced into food utensils for Suchun Zhai. The extraordinary porcelain in my hand, like the upright calligraphy of poems, calligraphy, and chapters in my eyes, comes from Master Jie Qing.

Top left: Brown glaze bowl, top right: blue and white glaze bowl, bottom left: bronze tea pot

"The shapes of the five kiln-mouth utensils in the Song Dynasty are produced this time using the two colors of Yue Kiln. One is Qianfeng emerald color and the other is yellow-green glaze (slightly yellow glaze). It took me about nearly a year to collect 20 pieces of tableware for a set. Porcelain design takes another half a year. Some Song Dynasty porcelain can be used as tableware, and some can be improved. For example, if you have a skimmer mouth, you will not have a big belly and a narrow mouth, so you can make it into a straight mouth, which is suitable for dressing up. But some models cannot."

The abbot Jie Qing invited me to have dinner at the Suchun Zhai of Jingci Temple. There is a gate that leads to the "Suchun Zhai" directly from the bustling West Lake Scenic Area. The words in this are all the calligraphy treasures of the great monk. Clivia, who enters the door to welcome guests,"comes without a trace, goes with current affairs. Why do you need to ask more about life? Only life is a dream." Correct but clumsy.

Jingci Temple is both a temple and an ancient temple. This word seems to be the gate between "eating" in the mortal world and the enlightenment of Buddhism. It made me, a vulgar person among vulgar people, feel a trace of Zen wisdom.

The vegetarian temple has its own cooking concept. In the "Suchun Zhai", you can't eat anything imitating meat. It emphasizes "straight-hearted" and eats whatever you want. I like the lobby that "you can eat when you are hungry, and you can sleep when you are sleepy." The state of mind behind these words comes from Ge Changgeng's "Shui Diao Ge Tou" in the Song Dynasty. Seeing it makes people relax.

Master Jie Qing's intention in designing these dishes is easily invisible. "When I imagined these dishes at that time, I didn't want to follow the Western-style methods outside. I really wanted to be appropriate and original. But it must intersect with the culture of the Song Dynasty. The Song Dynasty I know is that it takes a long time to prepare a dish. For example, if we want to eat vegetables in a week or half a month, we must start preparing what should be marinated at this time. Its complexity is in the early stage. In fact, a large number of vegetarian meals on the market are still accustomed to using Western-style dishes. But the Western-style presentation is actually different from our cultural presentation."

The appetizer is a bowl of warm porridge, and the millet used for the porridge is bought from Gyeongju. Compare the huge words that read on the second floor at the entrance,"Drunken wine is full of fresh wine, intoxicating people's consciousness. If vegetables eat vegetable soup, the stomach and intestines will be clear and empty, and there will be no residue or filth, so you can rest your body." ("Reading Mirror" by Chen Jiru in the Ming Dynasty). I felt echoed in my heart.

Due to the consideration of "health preservation", all fruits were removed from the menu of "Suchun Zhai". The master said that the fruits were cold and cool. The dishes adopt a mild diet that adjusts the five internal organs all year round. Combined with the formation of some of Hangzhou's more traditional vegetarian dishes, a large number of dishes are cooked with two thick soup: mushroom and seaweed.

The warmth of the utensils here is integrated with the food. I think of the Song banquet held by Zhao Gou in the Southern Song Dynasty. The banquet hosted by Qinghe Prince Zhang Jun (Yue Fei's boss) to Zhao Gou of Song Gaozong. It can be said to be a Chinese version of the "Buffett's feast". It was held at the Prince's palace, which is now Qinghe Fang, Hangzhou. Nearly 150 foods, each of which is carefully recorded in "Old Things in Wulin". The legendary Southern Song Dynasty official kilns should also be listed on the table.

I have eaten the theme dishes of the "Song Banquet" concept several times. The replica of "Yue Kiln Green Glazed Melon-Shaped Holding Pot" is actually relatively common in ordinary times, and now it is a representative of the Song style kettle.

Yue Kiln Green Glazed Melon-shaped Pot

However, it was the first time I saw the insulation bowl "Kongming Bowl" in Suchun Zhai. It was also called the Zhuge Bowl. Its biggest feature was that it was made of two bowls bonded top and bottom. The middle of the two bowls was left empty, and the bottom of the outer bowl was connected. There was a round hole in the center, and hot water was usually stored inside for insulation. People call this "Kong Ming Bowl" because of its beauty. In fact, this bowl has nothing to do with Zhuge Liang.

Lotus pattern stone tea mill

To my surprise, I also saw traces of "blue and white glaze carved bamboo hat bowl","Yue kiln green glaze holder" and "Ru kiln flower mouth holder" here.

Yue kiln green glaze holder (remnant)

In the past few days, I have been particularly touched by the words of Wu Yishen, an art collector born in the 1980s, who said,"I hope to solve the gap between ancient times and modern times." This is the case when eating vegetarian dishes with the flavor of the Song Dynasty. The beauty of food utensils is also constantly passed down and rebuilt. But no matter what, in color, aroma, the Song Dynasty also carried the color of food utensils.

"So, when we interpret anything, we can interpret the past tense from any element, but we must interpret it reasonably. We cannot stand on a departmentalism and take for granted what this thing is like. When we interpret such elements, we look at the cultural inheritance of food and tea." Abbot Jie Qing said.

The crystal cake made of hydrangea mushrooms in front of me is a refreshing starter, and its plate design has been improved. Master Jie Qing said: "The shape of some utensils may not be suitable for catering, so we changed them to one suitable for making tableware. For example, there will be some oval plate designs."

As midsummer unfolds, there are gradually more and more mushrooms, including matsutake, boletus, yellow ear fungus, bamboo tripe... It belongs to something you can enjoy. Even the crispy fried soybeans, a dish of "soy milk, tofu, and soybeans", which were served together for three generations, were promoted to "matsutake" at this time.

I am particularly obsessed with the mushroom soup here, replacing MSG with vegetarian stock, which is extremely fresh and moist.

A bowl of "Harmony of All Things"(traditional "vegetarian crab roe") contains ginger, monkey head mushroom, carrot paste, and mashed potatoes. It is simply seasoned with sweet and sour, making everyone who has eaten it exclaim. The taste of the mountains and wild trails is simply presented here.

Lohan Plain Noodles here have always been a signature. The soup looks rich, but in fact it tastes strong, but it tastes light. The noodles inside are closer to the texture of Udon noodles than traditional casual noodles, light and soft, suitable for summer. The big bowl for serving noodles has beautiful "folded eaves" and is considerate to prevent hot spots.

Yuan Mei, a gourmand in the Qing Dynasty, said in "Suiyuan Food List":"Delicious food is not as good as beautiful utensils, and the language is true." I think that if he travels back to modern times to eat, he will take this back. The things that we think are too delicate to touch now are all daily necessities for people to eat and drink. However, the "beauty of practicality" we are advocating now seems to really only be "practicality" left.

I still think that a Chinese meal with Song porcelain design is the most comfortable. The color is mainly bluish and white, and it is as warm as jade. It seems that a slight movement will destroy the beauty of pure silence. The color of celadon is like jade,"as clever as Fan Jin, and as refined as carved jade." The color of white porcelain is like smooth jade,"both the quality of jade and the white of white snow."

Since the end of the Northern Song Dynasty, Song porcelain has become the "top of ancient porcelain". Zhao Kuangyin, the Taizu of the Song Dynasty, was born as a general. When the Chenqiao mutiny, he was replaced by a yellow robe. He was focused on the establishment of a new dynasty and had no interest in art. After he pacified Sichuan, he transported many treasures from Meng Chang, the imperial palace of Later Shu, to Bianliang (present-day Henan). Among them was a gold basin inlaid with colorful gems. Zhao Kuangyin asked: "What is this for?" The ministers replied: "This is Meng Chang's small toilet pot." Zhao Kuangyin asked in question: "If she uses this to pee, what does he use for eating?" He scoffed at the obsession of luxury and wealth. Life should be simple.

The country built by our ancestors finally prospered, and the common people became polite and learned to be elegant, and culture and art began to develop unprecedentedly. Sky blue was the favorite of Song Huizong, the last emperor of the Northern Song Dynasty. It was between green and not just green. "After the rain, the sky is blue and the clouds break away, and this color makes the future", a dream-like color became the representative color of Ru porcelain, the first of the five official kilns in the Song Dynasty,"Official Brother Ru Dingjun". In the Ming Dynasty, there was a famous official named Gao Lian in Qiantang. He said that the glaze color of the Ru kiln: "The sky is the most precious, the pink blue is the best, and the sky blue is the most precious." Azure is a kind of warm blue, with an expression of sunny weather after rain, which can be encountered and cannot be sought. Pink blue is even more rare, and the probability of meeting "blue sky" is like winning the lottery.

Ruyao Huakou Zhanzuo

Glaze color also has aesthetics, such as moonlight white, pearl white, ivory white... These names are easy to understand at first glance,"I don't understand what black is and what white is." Once carefully inspected, it is not difficult for us to understand the charm. Any color we see is actually composite. The aesthetic foundation of the subtle uniqueness is our Chinese porcelain.

Glaze color is a miracle only after fighting fire. Every beautiful color can be eternal and lonely and deserves to be remembered.

I think what is more "human" is the "fried rice yellow glaze" in the official kiln. Probably because of the name of the food. To me, the word "fried" has a pyrotechnic aura and is more amiable. It was a product of insufficient kiln temperature. Officials originally wanted to burn "pink green glaze", but accidentally burned it to beige. Because there were so few qualified, the status of beige glaze in the Song Dynasty was gradually recognized. Perhaps in order to smooth the task, officials dared to give this color an elegant name "Canglang Color", which is the color of newly grown bamboo. As a result, because of "beauty", he still saved his life.

The official kilns of the Song Dynasty were divided into the official kilns of the Northern Song Dynasty and the official kilns of the Southern Song Dynasty, but they were all inseparable from a classic azure color. The official kiln of the Northern Song Dynasty was located in Bianjing (present-day Kaifeng, Henan) and has now been buried in the flooded sediment layer of the Yellow River. The official kilns at that time had the smell of Yellow River water, which was green and vast at a glance. In the Southern Song Dynasty, there were Xiunei Official Kilns and Jiaotanxia Official Kilns. In the early days, there were Yuyao Official Kilns and Pingjiang Official Kilns. Probably the first choice for firing ancient kilns around mountains and rivers. The Southern Song Dynasty official kilns were based on Fenghuang Mountain and Turtle Mountain in Hangzhou. At this time, the official kilns had the green scenery of the "green mountains and buildings outside the mountains" in the south of the Yangtze River.

According to Li Gang, deputy director of the Zhejiang Province Museum, Pingjiang Guan Kiln is a case, located on the flat ground south of Suzhou. The food utensils of Suchun Zhai are a combination of the Southern and Northern Song Dynasties. Eating at the table is also the moment when the eyes and tongue appreciate together.

Food and porcelain are essentially natural products. Master Jie Qing said that the temperature of porcelain fired in electric kilns is fixed and there is not much variability. "The changing tea bowl has a sense of flow. Under the daylight, under the sunshine, and under the indoor lights without turning on, the state it contains is different. Therefore, when drinking tea and eating, you will also have different perceptions. Compared with ancient times, the taste of pots and cups fired in new firewood kilns and cups fired in electric kilns has changed. Natural transformation is complex and sometimes uncontrollable. Falling ash and changes in kiln temperature produce colors that can be perceived at every level. In fact, you can't read through every level. The same is true for kimchi. When you hold it in your mouth, its taste comes out one level after another. In fact, there are still many subtle levels sandwiched in the middle. You are stimulated by two powerful things, and then you can't taste the thing in the middle." Then the eggplant hidden in the stuffing inside the Chunzhai steamed buns brings a secret soft aroma, but I could never guess it.

When the lanterns were first turned on, I realized that this was the best view spot to view Leifeng Tower. The "Tower View" was delicious and delicious, with different days in the four seasons. This is also part of the delicacy of vegetarian food.

🍌

The goddess asked

Are you vegetarian?

"If you are vegetarian, you will not be angry,

Stay alone, the spirit will not be turbid,

Sitting silently will keep your heart calm,

Reading makes your mouth sound."

--Zeng Guofan

Food Bless You!

Consultant for "Flavor World 3"

Owner of "God's Table"

Producer of "Food Wild China"