Chinese Food Culture: Wine, the Beverage of Romance (1)
Alcohol drinks are a kind of material culture shared by all nationalities of the world. Before the advent of distillation machines, wine could only be made the primitive way. Using crops to make wine is a special characteristic in Chinese alcohol-making history. The yellow wine, or rice wine, being one of the three main kinds of alcohol beverage (rice wine, grape wine and beer), is known as the model of oriental winemaking.
Winemaking and drinking originated in China long ago. Ancient writings point to multiple origins of alcoholic drinks, but only a small portion can be taken as true history. In common society, Dukang is worshipped as the god of wine, as he was the one who first made wine. However, as early as the Shang Dynasty, the Chinese already widely practiced the making of alcohol. From existing oracle bone and bronze inscriptions, we learn that many people of the Shang used wine as offerings to ancestors. At the same time, drinking wine was already popular. In more recent archeological excavations, Shang Dynasty winemaking sites were discovered. In 1980, in Henan Province, ancient wines from the late Shang period (about 3,000 years ago) was discovered in archaic tombs, and are now kept at Beijing Palace Museum. It can be considered the oldest wine in China. Being large in land mass and with abundant natural resources, China’s different agricultural crops, water quality and winemaking techniques in each region, gave birth to many excellent types of liquor throughout the land.
A very important winemaking innovation by the ancient Chinese was the use of yeast. The primitive forms of yeast were molded or germinated crops, mainly wheat and rice. People reformed the molded crops to make distiller’s yeast. The yeast contains bacteria that turn starch into sugar and saccharomycete, which facilitate the forming of alcohol. Different kinds of yeast are adopted in different regions, making for more varieties in wines. In the Northern and Southern Dynasties (420-589 A.D.), winemaking techniques have already reached tremendously high levels. The book Qimin Yaoshu recorded a dozen ways of making wine yeast.
This natural way of wine fermentation, after thousands of years, has become quite a proven technique. Its basic winemaking principle and technique is still in use today. Using this method to make wine relies mostly on experience and is limited to small-scale production, as it is usually performed through manual labor. Wines produced in such a way have no exact scientific testing standards.
The basic ingredient for rice wine varies by region. In the north, it is sorghum, millet and glutinous millet. While in the south, mostly rice (sticky rice being the best choice) is used. The wine’s alcohol content is usually around 15 proof, and becomes tastier as time goes by. Yellow wine’s color is not always yellow, as some are black or red. When filtering technique for wine has not been fully developed, wines are usually muddy in transparency. The ancients referred to such as “white wine” or “turbid wine.”
Starting in the Song Dynasty, Chinese culture and economic centers moved southward, the production of yellow wine became even more prevalent in the southern provinces. By the Yuan Dynasty, spirit drinks popularized in the north as yellow wine production slumped. The southerners do not drink spirit as much as the northerners, therefore yellow wine production remained high in the south. In the Qing Dynasty, yellow wine made in Shaoxing of Zhejiang Province dominated the domestic and even overseas markets. Even now, drinkers of yellow wine still prefer “Shaoxing Yellow Wine.”
In many parts of China exist families that have the tendency of making their own wines. It demonstrates just how popular the method of using yeast in winemaking is. Some devoted wine drinkers believe, truly delicious wines come not from wineries, but from hands of skillful common people. Adding “major yeast (made with wheat, barley etc.)” to long-grained Indica rice inside a wine jar and sealing it for over a month, rice wine of about 40-50 proof can be made. Using “minor yeast (made with rice)” with glutinous rice and sealing it for several days would produce fermented glutinous rice wine of about 10 proof; if sealed for over a month, it would yield sweet wine. Regardless of rice wine or sweet wine, the longer it is sealed, the stronger the flavor. Fermented glutinous rice wine is simple to make and is an inexpensive and delicious tonic drink. The drinking of fermented glutinous rice wine in southern China is quite popular. As always, many try to look from a medical perspective, believing in alcohol’s healing ability. Medicinal wines are made to improve the circulatory system and preserve health.
Traditional Chinese white liquor (spirits) is the most characteristic of distilled alcohol. At around 6th to 8th century, China already has its distilled liquor. Primitive distillation was another one of the Chinese contributions to winemaking. From the end of the 19th to early 20th century, after the introduction of microbiology, biochemistry and engineering sciences from the West, China’s traditional winemaking technology experienced great changes. Mechanization standards greatly improved and production yield increased as a result. Guizhou and Sichuan provinces in southwestern China are the two publicly acclaimed provinces in production of superior grade white wine. Even so, due to differences in natural produce, every region in the north and south use different base ingredients. Nearly every province would produce its own unique label with tastes to match the local provincial inhabitants. Hence Chinese wines come in no less than forty to fifty varieties, much more than what is known internationally, namely the Luzhou Laojiao, Guizhou Maotai, Shangxi Fenjiu and Shaanxi Xifengjiu. China’s oldest beer brewery was built in 1900 in the city of Harbin. Even though beer brewing has only been in China for less than one hundred years, beer is already the top selling alcohol in China.
Unfinished, to be continued …………… （http://www.nicechinesefood.com/chinese-culture/chinese-food-culture-wine-the-beverage-of-romance-2.html）
