#20 19 Notes on Returning Home # Killing pig kicks urine.
I have never forgotten the scene of killing pigs in my hometown, and it is still vivid in my mind. ...
In my memory, after my father set a good day, he began to ask people to help kill pigs. Neighbors, relatives and friends were invited. So that I often hear my mother nagging my father before killing pigs every year: you have no idea for a year, and killing pigs requires more than a dozen people! Father will say: no less, no less how to kill pigs!
Yes, in my hometown, no matter who killed Nianzhu, I would ask someone close to me for help. It is said that helping is also a gathering of friends. If no one helps, they will be laughed at, indicating that this family is not welcome in the village at ordinary times.
I remember that every year in the twelfth lunar month, my father became a pig killer, and almost all the pigs in the village were killed by my father. I remember it so clearly because there is an established rule in my hometown that after the pig is killed, people will send some cooked meat and blood sausage to my dad. The most important thing is to give my dad a pig bone called life-saving bone as a thank-you gift for killing pigs, and this life-saving bone was actually eaten by my brother and me.
So, if I follow my father's idea, I can call the whole village to help me kill pigs, but my careful mother has to settle accounts!
After the person who helped kill the pig was determined, my father began to sharpen his knife and borrowed the big wooden bathtub in the village to make all kinds of preparations in advance. The next day, my parents got up before dawn. When my brother and I got up, my mother had already boiled water in the kitchen, which was later used for scalding pigs, so she burned a large pot. It's just dawn Yesterday, people who agreed to help kill pigs came one after another. Father makes tea for everyone and takes flower buns. After everyone arrived, they ate early and the water in the pot was boiling.
At this time, my father first took a few young and agile people to catch pigs in the pigsty, and everyone helped. After the pig quits the circle, tie the front and rear hooves, tie the pig's mouth and put it on the door panel prepared in advance. I saw that my father's hand had picked up the shiny pig-killing knife that had killed countless pigs in the village, and an uncle was carrying a big vegetable basin to get pig blood.
Whenever this time, I will timidly pull my brother into the room. I will bury my head in the quilt to cover my ears, while my brother will look out on the glass of the window. Although the pork was delicious last year, I was really afraid to hear the pig barking before it was killed. The voice is loud and harsh, and I still feel palpitations until now.
When the pigs outside are quiet, the younger brother will say, OK, OK, you can go out. We both ran out of the room at a sprint speed of 100 meters, but I still didn't dare to get too close to the pig, just watching from a distance. Because I remember one year, my family killed two pigs, and my father, a half-baked pig killer, didn't kill any of them, ready to burn to death! The pig suddenly jumped up. Fortunately, the hoof was pricked, otherwise the consequences would be unimaginable, but hot water was still splashed everywhere. As for the pig, naturally he was stabbed by his father again. From then on, I never dared to see the killed pig up close. I always feel that the pig lying on the door panel will jump at any time.
But I can't help but want to see it. I don't just want pork. Actually, what my brother and I want more is pig urine. Yes, pig urine, finally. In that era when toys were scarce, pig urine was the toy of a group of children in our whole alley, and we could play football all afternoon.
Because of the impatience of waiting, the process of scalding pigs is particularly long. But pigs always get burned. When the whole pig hangs on the ladder, it has become clean pork. After the pig was cut open and before it was cut into eight pieces, my father held a mysterious ceremony every year, commonly known as "breaking the plate" and "offering Buddha" in his hometown.
Father cut some important parts of the pig, then put a piece of yellow paper in the iron spoon that was burned red in advance, and then put the meat in the iron spoon. I only heard the sound of "zi", a white smoke rose, the yellow paper was on fire, and the air was filled with the smell of burnt meat. At that time, I felt mysterious and a little scared. As long as you get to the main house and see the sacrifice burned by your father on the ground, you should hurry around.
But these are not my concerns. My brother and I are just waiting for the pig urine to stop. After getting the pig urine bladder, my brother couldn't wait to empty it, then threw it into the soil and rubbed it hard with his feet, because the urine bladder blown up like this was only enough to resist kicking. Blowing urine is naturally my brother's job, but more often, my uncles who help kill pigs have helped us blow it.
The blown bladder was thrown over, and a group of children rushed in like dogs throwing bones at them and began to plunder. It was not until my brother divided the friends in the yard into two groups that the looting ended. This is not because my younger brother is fierce, but because my younger brother is the owner of today's diaper rash. My brother often divides us into boys and girls. Then everyone started kicking. We kicked this allantoin from the yard to the alley, and then kicked it from the alley to the street. If you don't play football, the game won't end ...
Of course, there is another situation, that is, when the pork was cooked in 2008, everyone followed the smell of meat and kicked my house again. Don't ask us why we are so crazy, because the bladder will freeze hard the next day, and then it will break after kicking, so we all know that the bladder can't be kicked overnight.
When we returned to the yard, the pork in 2008 was already very strong. Pig blood has been poured into the cleaned large intestine, and the heart, liver and lungs have been put into the pot. Mom has been entertaining everyone's New Year's pork rice. The meat cooked in the pot on the day of killing the pig is also very delicate. Of course, it is usually cooked with pig neck meat, which is commonly known as pig collar meat in my hometown. Because the meat is fat but not greasy, it is especially delicious. Now I think there may be another reason, that is, pig neck meat is stained with a lot of pig blood and should not be stored!
In fact, my favorite food is pig blood sausage. If cooked, it is delicious on earth. When I saw my father pouring pig blood into the large intestine, he would put a proper amount of salt, pepper and chopped green onion in the pig blood, and the most important thing was to put some pieces of suet, so that the pig blood sausage was moderate in hardness and excellent in taste. In addition, freshly cooked pork liver is also my favorite. As for the pig neck, I'm just looking around.
A group of children are still making trouble in the yard, and my mother and sister have served pork on the top of my kang table for the year. There are pork neck cut into large pieces and sprinkled with salt and pepper, pork sausage, pork liver and fried pork slices. So a big plate of meat is placed on the kang table under the eaves, which is a truly primitive and bold way to eat. Until now, I still remember my uncles standing or sitting, munching on pig neck meat, drinking in a big glass, punching and kicking that can shake off the snow on the eaves, and friends with oily little black mouths. ...
At that time, people's lives were far from being rich and convenient now. In rural areas, under normal circumstances, many people can't eat fresh meat on weekdays, but last year's bacon must have been eaten by the end of the year, so this year's pigs were killed, and the first meal was to satisfy their hunger. In the past, in my hometown in the countryside, almost every family would feed a pig. From February to March of the lunar calendar to the twelfth lunar month, when I was released, I was basically a big fat pig weighing more than 200 kilograms. People with good conditions feed two heads in a row, and that kind of family is the envy of the village. Naturally, such families usually have oil mills at home, because two pigs can't feed anyone.
Later, life got better and better, and my mother was very proud. She fed two pigs every year and killed all the twelfth lunar month. At that time, there was no refrigerator or freezer at home. In the days after killing pigs in 2008, my mother was the busiest. She wants to marinate the bones of two pigs and pork belly (because bacon can be preserved) and let her father hang it on the beam of our kitchen, so that the bones can be eaten before the 30th and the bacon can be eaten for a whole year. In the leftover meat, my mother will leave enough meatballs made in jiaozi for years, hang them under the eaves outside, and let nature freeze in this natural refrigerator. Mother cut all the remaining meat and fried it into minced meat and sliced meat.
Now think about my mother's cooking skills. It's really good. That vat of minced meat, which we have eaten for more than half a year, is still delicious and will not go bad, let alone go bad. Bacon turned out to be bright pink after curing, and it was really delicious after slicing. In my hometown in the countryside, no one would sell Nian pig if I didn't have to, because that pig is the meat of a family for a year. If someone really sells the pig, it will also attract ridicule and gossip from neighbors, thinking that the situation at home is not good.
In my hometown, no matter who killed Nian pig, I would give some early adopters to my neighbors and relatives, and often a bowl of Nian pork stew was given to my neighbors. In fact, it is to stew the soaked dried radish slices or cabbage in a meat soup pot. After stewing, my mother scooped up bowls of steaming stews and put them in baskets. My sister and I went door to door to deliver them to our neighbors. Because there is a lot of meat cooked in the soup, it is very fat and thick, so the stew is also very fragrant. If you have a problem with anyone before, send this bowl of Sichuan style stew pork, and forgive a bowl of meat dishes.
This bowl of pot-stewed vegetables conveys the growth of annual flavor and deepens the feelings between neighbors. I often feel that my parents seem to be in awe of food, especially meat, which is reflected in many details of life. I think this may be a subconscious! China has been a big agricultural country since ancient times, so the worship of food is more like a kind of inheritance. You see Zhu's family instructions also say: a porridge and a meal, when thinking about it, is not easy; It is difficult to keep thinking about material resources.
Of course, relatives and people are not given braised dishes, but some cooked meat, blood sausage and pig liver. The form of delivery is also unique. After the mother cuts the meat into small pieces according to the relationship, the father will bring clean bamboo sticks prepared in advance, string them one by one on the bamboo sticks, put them in the basket, and take out a bunch at the door of relatives' house.
The next day, my father will also invite the old people in the neighborhood and some elders from the same family to the house, invite them to have tea and pork, and chat with them about their parents' gossip. ...
At this point, the annual pig killing activity is over.
And my mother's kitchen is still busy. If there is too much broth left over in a year, my mother will cook her specialty-mixed noodles rice. It seems to be bean powder in my memory, so my mother sprinkled it into the broth and kept stirring it until it was moderately thick, then scooped it out and put it on the chopping board to dry. The next day, you can fry it with meat, eat it cold and pour it with minced meat. According to your parents, it's delicious. But I didn't seem to like it at that time, and I basically didn't eat a bite, so now I can't remember what miso rice tastes like …
In rural areas, killing pigs was a large-scale warm-up activity before the Spring Festival. You can eat and play. Adults eat pork, children kick urine, and everyone is happy. After killing the pig, you can count the days of the New Year with a finger.
I went back to my hometown a few days ago to relive the joy and excitement in my memory. But now, because of convenient transportation and abundant food, most people in rural areas don't feed pigs, so even when they return to their hometown, such a grand scene of killing pigs is becoming less and less common.
However, when I went back to my hometown this time, I found that the muddy alley had become a clean and tidy cement pavement, and the tall elm tree in the depths of the alley disappeared. All the houses in the community have been renovated, which makes my old house short and lonely.
Perhaps, all progress and changes are painful, but who can stop the wheel of the times from rumbling past?
Yes! With the passage of time and the change of people's concept of life, those simple, lively, poor and happy days are really gone forever. ...
Hedgehog X | 20 19 "Notes on the Return of the Native" epoch-making non-fiction story contest