Tofu dish in ancient Chinese culinary culture

Tofu is a typical side dish with a 2,000-year history in Chinese culinary culture. Tofu has entered folk songs, proverbs and generations of stories. As a daily food for Chinese people, tofu has even become an object of philosophical thinking. Legend has it that Zhou Xi, a great scholar of the Song Dynasty, stopped eating tofu because he discovered the absurdity of this simple food. He did an experiment and found that the weight of finished tofu often exceeded the total weight of ingredients, additives and water. He couldn’t explain this so he decided not to eat it because it went against the principle of balance.

Tofu during the Qing Dynasty

Tofu was popular everywhere in China during the Song Dynasty. By the Qing Dynasty, it became the daily food of the royal family, nobles, poor people, rich merchants and soldiers.

Tofu in the Royal Palace

In the book “Thanh Cung Thien Da Duong”, it is recorded that tofu always occupies an indispensable place on the dining table of Qianlong and Empress Dowager Cixi. Especially Cixi, because she discovered the health and skin benefits of soft pieces of tofu, she ordered that every meal must have a dish made from tofu, such as stewed tofu, tofu, etc. goat meat stew…

During the Qing Dynasty, food was divided according to clear regulations. In the “National Court History” it is written that from the Emperor to the Concubine, the Crown Prince, the Prince… the food for cooking for each person every day has a separate list of regulations. In it, every mailing list has tofu.

For example, the list of foods the Queen Mother eats every day includes up to 1kg of tofu. Furthermore, according to Qing royal regulations, the amount of tofu was divided according to hierarchy. From there, it can be seen that tofu became an essential food right from the Qing Dynasty.

Tofu among wealthy aristocrats

For aristocrats, officials and the wealthy, tofu is also a common food.

In records of the Qing Dynasty, tofu was extremely popular at banquets of officials.

Tofu in common people’s lives

In the lives of common people during the Qing Dynasty, tofu was also a very popular food, and also showed the differences between ethnicities and regions.

In the North, tofu is mainly salted with salt, from which it is called aged tofu. In the south, people add gypsum to make soft tofu.

The Tho Gia ethnic group has a tradition of making “blood tofu” (tofu mixed with clean pig’s blood) on July 1 every year. The famous Mapo tofu dish of the Ba Shu region (Sichuan) with its characteristic spicy taste has become famous since ancient times and is now reaching international level.

Tofu – a mirror reflecting society at that time

Since tofu has become so popular in life, the upper classes in society have always sought to raise tofu to a new level, completely different from the common people.

Emperor Kangxi loved dishes made from tofu. This love was so great that he considered tofu a gift for elderly mandarins. He even instructed the royal chef to teach the cooking method to the chefs in the mandarin’s palace, considering enjoying the delicious taste of tofu as the enjoyment of his last years of life.

A piece of tofu contains the huge difference between officials and people, between greed and integrity, between rich and poor. A piece of tofu can reflect the difference in class and social life during the Qing Dynasty.

Tofu – part of Chinese culinary culture

Tofu production during the Qing Dynasty developed rapidly, producing many different types of tofu, with diverse shapes and equally rich flavors and colors.

For poor people in the lower class, tofu is a nutritious, cheap food that can be bought anywhere. But if you keep eating the same taste, you will inevitably get bored. Since then, people have created many processing methods based on how to preserve tofu according to the season.

From the perspective of the upper social class, taste and appetite are one of human instincts. Chinese cooking spices are extremely rich, plus adequate conditions (kitchen utensils, rare and expensive ingredients…), the rich at that time could create many dishes from tofu. Unique and delicate, of course ordinary people cannot enjoy it.

Along with satisfying the taste buds, food therapy and nourishment is also one of the traditional features of Chinese culinary culture. This creates more space for the way to make and prepare tofu to flourish. This explains why Emperor Kangxi decided to give and encourage older mandarins to eat so much tofu.