What is the food culture in Japan? Pray for the great gods.

When it comes to diet, it's not only Japanese food with rice as the staple food and vegetables, fish and meat as the non-staple food, but also China food in western Europe, where you can enjoy all kinds of meals. Japan is a country with abundant high-quality water resources and perfect sanitary facilities, so you can drink tap water anywhere in Japan. Modern Japanese culture is even more colorful. While studying the traditional Japanese culture since ancient times, such as tea ceremony and flower path, girls can also dance disco. It is not unusual to see cities, ancient temples and tall buildings built next to each other. Therefore, modern Japanese culture is a combination of ancient culture, emerging culture, western culture and eastern culture. Japanese people generally like to eat raw fish, so sushi wrapped in sashimi is the most popular food in Japan. Japanese cuisine attaches great importance to maintaining the original flavor of food, and does not advocate adding too much seasoning, mainly light. Especially for the dishes, the requirements are very high. Not only do you use all kinds of exquisite containers to hold food, but the shape, arrangement and color matching of food are carefully considered. Looking at Japanese cuisine as exquisite as landscape painting, tourists who have just arrived in Japan often can't bear to destroy that beauty. Eating habits Japanese cold noodles are placed on bamboo boards, picked up with chopsticks and eaten in cold soup. Some restaurants don't have spoons, so Japanese people are used to picking them up and drinking soup. Nightlife Japanese people are used to drinking in groups after work. In the entertainment center of metropolis, there are bars, discos and nightclubs everywhere. Japanese alcoholic beer: Japanese people like to drink beer best, whether it is draft beer or bottled beer. In summer, some department stores have outdoor beer halls, which attract a large number of tourists. Sake: Sake can be drunk hot or cold. No matter what kind of sake, it is the best match for Japanese cuisine. Wine tastes fragrant and sweet, and it is easy to get drunk if you drink too much. Whiskey: Japanese people like to drink whisky and well wine. This wine is made of sweet potato, barley, sucrose and other raw materials. The filtered alcohol is a bit like vodka. In Japan, China's food culture had a great influence on Japan, whether during the Tang Dynasty's envoy to the Tang Dynasty, when Zen Buddhism was introduced to Japan, and during the Japanese-Ming trade and Edo period. For example, soybeans, red beans, rice, millet, corn and other crops cultivated in Japan, as well as sauce, wine, vinegar, salt, lobster sauce and sour rice balls commonly used in Japanese diet, were mainly introduced to Japan through China. It can be said that the formation of Japanese food culture is mainly influenced by China culture. Japanese diet can generally be divided into staple food and non-staple food. Rice is the staple food, while vegetables and fish are non-staple food. From the Middle Ages to the Meiji period, influenced by Buddhist thought, Japanese people had taboos on meat, so they seldom ate meat. After Meiji, this taboo was eliminated. After World War II, pasta such as bread was also popular in Japanese diet. With the economic growth and the continuous infiltration of western culture, the intake of meat and dairy products has also increased significantly. Coupled with the popularity of fast food, the Japanese diet has become more diversified. Cooking methods mainly include boiling, frying, roasting and cold salad, with miso soup and pickles. Now there are many combinations of western food or Chinese food in non-staple food. There are several words with "fire" in China's cooking methods, such as explosion, stir-frying, stir-frying, simmering, burning, stir-frying and stewing, which are hard to find in Japanese. Japanese cuisine is characterized by raw, cold, less fat, less weight, many kinds and beautiful colors, and it is very particular about the choice of utensils. That is, natural color, delicious taste, diverse shapes and excellent utensils. Japanese cuisine is also called "five flavors, five colors and five methods" cuisine. The five flavors are sweet, sour, pungent, bitter and salty; The five colors are white, yellow, cyan, red and black; These five methods are raw, boiled, roasted, fried and steamed. The criteria for tasting Japanese food are fragrant, rich, cooked, sweet and tender. Because Japanese cuisine emphasizes appearance and texture, the quantity of each dish is usually small, but the quality of raw materials is unparalleled. What they emphasize most is fresh materials, exquisite knife work and artistic display. When eating Japanese food, you can see the "harmony" on the menu, the so-called miscellaneous brocade. Usually, the store will supply mixed brocade with a specific flavor, with pine, bamboo and plum representing large, medium and small, and mostly divided by weight and material. Loose over-dressed, bamboo over-dressed, plum ordinary. This shows that Japanese food is very elegant. Japanese people usually eat with wooden chopsticks. Their chopsticks are shorter than those in China, and those of women are shorter than those of men, 22cm for men and 2 1cm for women. There are many kinds of Japanese cuisine, the most famous of which is Shi Huai cuisine. Literally means holding a stone in your arms. It is said that a long time ago, a monk could only eat one meal every morning. Of course, at night, you will be hungry, cold and hungry. So the monks figured out a way to hold the heated stone in their arms (Shi Wen). Later, people called light vegetarian food and simple food that only fills the stomach and heats the body Shi Huai Cai. In fact, this idea comes from Zen. Because Zen is closely related to tea ceremony, some simple foods that are only eaten before drinking tea are also called Shi Huai Cai. However, nowadays, people call Shi Huai's small amount of tea before meals "Shi Huai Cai". Shi Huai Cai is simple and elegant, but it also pays great attention to the quiet environment. Zhuofu cuisine The dining table is China's dining table, namely the Eight Immortals dining table. Zhuofu cuisine is a kind of China cuisine, including mushrooms, fish cakes, vegetable noodle soup and noodles. It is characterized by the guests sitting in armchairs around the table, and all the meals are put on one table. This kind of cuisine originated from the ancient Buddhist vegetarianism in China, and was praised by Zen master Yuan Yin as a "general tea ceremony cuisine" (that is, a dish in which tea replaces wine). Because it is very popular in Nagasaki, it is also called Nagasaki cuisine. Chefs used local aquatic meat in Buddhist vegetarian dishes and created Zhuofu cuisine. Zhuofu cuisine mainly includes shark fin clear soup, tea, large plate, medium plate, side dishes, stews, rice cake bean soup and fruits. Small dishes are divided into five dishes, seven dishes and nine dishes, with seven dishes being the majority. Put all the side dishes on the table at the beginning, and put shark fin clear soup and other dishes on the table when eating. Tea will cook. Tea ceremony prevailed in Muromachi era (14th century) in Japan, so tea banquets and tea party cooking appeared. The original tea party cooking was just an ornament of the tea ceremony, which was very simple. By the end of Muromachi, it became very luxurious. Later, Morino, the founder of the tea ceremony, also restored the original light and simple appearance of tea party cooking. Tea party cooking should try to save space and labor, and the staple food only uses three kinds of utensils: rice bowl, soup bowl and small dish. During the dinner, there are soup, prunes and fruits, and sometimes two or three delicacies are served, and finally tea is served. Practice cooking. Practice cuisine is also called "intensive cuisine", which means eating fast and being vegetarian. The ingredients are buckwheat noodles, tofu, pickles, fried shrimp and so on. In fact, the so-called "essence cuisine" is a vegetarian cuisine that does not use meat. Sashimi Sashimi is the most famous Japanese cuisine and a masterpiece of Japanese cuisine. Japan has the habit of eating raw food since ancient times. Before the Edo era, sashimi was mainly made of snapper, flounder and perch, all of which were white. After Meiji, tuna and bonito with red meat became the first-class materials for sashimi. Now, the Japanese slice shellfish and lobsters, which is also called "sashimi". The puffer fish with detoxified slices is the best sashimi, fresh and delicious, but expensive. Sashimi must be seasoned with mustard and soy sauce. Mustard, called Wasabi in Japanese, is a very clean plant ("wasabi"). It grows under waterfalls or mountain springs and will wither when it is polluted. Wasabi is like radish, with black skin and green flesh. After grinding, dip in soy sauce when eating sashimi. Mustard has a special pungent smell, which is both bactericidal and appetizing. Japanese sashimi is unusually fresh, uniform in thickness and consistent in length. Sashimi dishes are dotted with shredded white radish, seaweed and perilla flowers, which embodies Japan's food culture close to nature. The practice of sashimi is also a concern of many people. Actually, the practice of sashimi is relatively simple. It is not difficult to make sashimi as long as you master the basic processes of material selection, knife work, plate loading and seasoning. Raw materials for making sashimi are extensive, but mainly fish and other seafood produced in the deep sea. Such as salmon, swordfish, bass, tuna, etc.; Crustaceans include sea urchin shrimp and lobster; Shellfish include abalone, oyster, Hong Bei and arctic shellfish. The raw material selection of sashimi is very strict, and the raw materials should be fresh, clean and pollution-free. Beautiful appearance is a major feature of sashimi, so the process of plate loading is particularly important. Sashimi is usually served with semi-circular, boat-shaped or fan-shaped exquisite tableware, with fresh coriander, perilla leaves, mint leaves, seaweed, chrysanthemum, cucumber flowers, ginger slices, shredded radish and lime as auxiliary materials. These ornaments can not only play the role of decoration and embellishment, but also play the role of removing fishy smell and increasing appetite. For example, first spread perilla leaves or lettuce leaves on a plate, then put 5-7 sliced salmon slices (that is, one person) on the perilla leaves and decorate them with shredded radish and cucumber flowers, giving people a very refreshing feeling. Mustard and Japanese light soy sauce are the main condiments of sashimi, and green mustard is often used in powder and paste. Mustard powder is made by mixing mustard powder with water at the ratio of 1: 2, and then sealing for 3 minutes. When the unique spicy taste of mustard is produced, it can be put into the plate. Paste mustard is a finished product, which can be directly squeezed into the dish when used. Sushi Sushi, also known as "Four Happy Meals", is the representative of Japanese cuisine. Japanese rice is rich in nutrition and high in quality. The cooked rice looks like pearls and smells good. The Japanese call rice a "relic" and a "silver relic", describing it as crystal clear and precious as a Buddha's bone. Sushi is a unique food in Japanese cuisine. There are many kinds of sushi. According to different production methods, it can be mainly divided into raw sushi, cooked sushi, pressed sushi, sushi, sushi, sushi, squid sushi, etc. Among them, squid sushi is regarded as the most famous and representative sushi in Japanese cuisine. Crucian carp sushi is made of crucian carp, rice and refined salt after several months of pickling and fermentation. Sushi made by this method will produce a large number of lactic acid bacteria in the raw materials, adding a special sour taste to the finished product, and these lactic acid bacteria themselves also have antiseptic effect. However, this kind of sushi made by ancient methods is rare today. Modern Japanese sushi is mostly processed with vinegar mixed with rice, and because more than four seasonings are usually added to rice, sushi is also called "four-happy rice". The main raw material commonly used in sushi is sushi rice, that is, Japanese japonica rice, which is characterized by white color and round particles. Rice cooked with it is not only elastic, chewy, but also sticky. Secondly, the raw materials used in sushi wrapping, that is, high-quality seaweed, seaweed, kelp, egg roll skin, bean curd skin, spring roll skin, Chinese cabbage and so on, are very common. Then there is the filling of sushi. Sushi has rich and colorful fillings, which can best reflect the characteristics of sushi. The raw materials used for stuffing are marine fish, crab meat, shellfish, freshwater fish, fried eggs and seasonal fresh vegetables such as mushrooms, cucumbers and lettuce. Authentic sushi can have sour, sweet, bitter, spicy, salty and other flavors. Therefore, when eating sushi, you should match the seasoning according to the type of sushi. For example, when eating sushi, there are sashimi, fresh shrimp and so on. On the stuffing, it is necessary to dip in thick soy sauce and apply a proper amount of green mustard; When eating sushi, it is best not to dip in soy sauce, so as to get its original flavor. In addition to thick soy sauce and green mustard, sushi also has a more important seasoning, which is vinegar ginger. Adding a slice of vinegar ginger to sushi not only helps to enhance flavor, but also makes sushi more delicious. Tempura We often hear the name "Tempura" in Japanese dramas. In fact, "tempura" is fried food. It is to make paste with flour, eggs and water, then wrap fish, shrimp and vegetables with starch and fry them in oil pan until golden brown. Dip in soy sauce and radish sauce when eating, which is delicious, fragrant but not greasy. Sukiyaki. "Shouxi Shao", also known as Japanese hot pot, was popularized in the second half of the19th century. It slices beef, cooks it with seafood and vegetables, and eats it with seasonings made of raw egg juice, soy sauce and sugar. This eating habit existed in ancient Japan. Before the Meiji Restoration, farmers cooked animal meat on hoes outside the house, which was originally called "hoe burning". Later, it developed into a kind of "Xi Shou Shao". Onions, tofu, fish and vegetables were added to the iron pot in the pit, and everyone cooked it. The stone burns. "Burning stone" means burning slate. Is to boil the cow on a hot stone and dip it in fresh soy sauce. This kind of beef is raised with special feeding techniques. It is said that during the feeding period, cows will be regularly given some beer with low alcohol content (4% ~ 5%) to make their blood gas run and accelerate their metabolism, and then they will be brushed all over the cow with some hay or brushes to make the fat evenly distributed, instead of the red and white beef we often see. Therefore, this kind of beef, called "Kobe Cattle" and "Matsuzaka Cattle", is soft and tender, and tastes delicious. It is specially used for burning slate. A burning bird. That is, roast chicken is to slice the chicken, string it on a thin bamboo stick, dip it in soy sauce, sugar, cooking wine and so on. , and then put it on the fire. It is also useful to use chicken or pig viscera as raw materials, but they are all called roast birds. It is very cheap, and many people like to use it as an appetizer. "Bird burning houses" can be seen everywhere in Japan. Teppanyaki is very popular in Japan. Authentic Japanese Teppanyaki, as its name implies, is to barbecue all kinds of delicious food on a big iron plate. Teppanyaki is an expensive Japanese dish because it uses the best materials, such as fresh seafood, including lobster and abalone, and domestic cattle, such as Kobe cattle, Matsuzaka cattle or Jinjiang cattle, which are also used as meat. College food. There are two main types of canteens in Japanese universities-rice and noodles. According to different side dishes, rice is divided into curry, stir-fry, fried rice and bibimbap. Common Japanese curries include general beef curry, fried meat pie curry and fried mashed potato cake curry; Common cooking types are ginger roast, mapo tofu and fried eggplant; Fried prawns, fried vegetables and so on are common. As for cooking with fish and oysters, it is probably too expensive to eat in the school cafeteria. There are beef rice, pork rice and chicken rice in the mixed rice. The name of chicken bibimbap sounds a bit cruel. Called "parent-child" bibimbap, it is to stew chicken and eggs together to make bibimbap. Noodles are mainly divided into white, thick and soft udon noodles, thin and yellow egg Lamian Noodles, and buckwheat noodles that are neither white nor yellow according to noodle processing methods. Cooking at school is relatively cheap, and a meal is generally around 500 yen. If you are in a restaurant outside, it is at least 700 ~ 1000 yen. As mentioned above, there are several kinds of noodles in Japan, such as Lamian Noodles, buckwheat noodles, wide noodles and udon noodles. These pasta ingredients are exquisite and cheap. Especially buckwheat noodles, are very popular foods. Order food. A popular dish in Japanese restaurants today is called "A la carte", which means everyone has a meal. Among them, there are only half a bowl of rice, a small dish of hot dishes, two small bowls of soup and fruit, and a small dish of pickles. All the meals add up to just enough for people to eat, but not too full. Japanese cuisine also pays attention to making good use of the beauty of "surplus white" in the plate. The result of this is often that the container is bigger and there are fewer dishes, so that "leftover white" can be used to decorate and set off the aesthetic feeling of dishes. Natto. Natto is one of the most national foods in Japan, and most Japanese like it very much in their daily life and eat it frequently. Natto is made from beans called "adzuki beans" by the Japanese in a special way. The appearance of natto is dark, sticky to the mouth and tasteless, including salty taste. So most foreigners are not used to it, and even it makes them sick. In fact, natto is rich in nutritional value, including protein, various amino acids, vitamins and minerals. This is a very valuable nutritious food. Moreover, the latest research also shows that natto has a strong inhibitory effect on the reproduction of pathogenic Escherichia coli, the "culprit" causing large-scale food poisoning. Japanese favorite wines and drinks Among Japanese favorite wines, Japanese wines (alcohol concentration 15% ~ 16%) are used in a considerable amount. Japanese wine is made of rice, which is found all over the country, but the producing areas of famous wines are concentrated in places with good water quality or good rice quality. Among them, the famous producing areas are ebony in Hyogo Prefecture, Fujian in Kyoto and Xitiao in Hiroshima. Japanese wine is usually drunk warm. Japanese also often drink beer, but almost all of them drink domestic beer, the most famous ones are Kirin beer and Asahi beer, and Tsingtao beer from China is also very popular in Japan. Whether in winter or summer, the Japanese like to drink iced beer, and the Japanese think that beer that has not been iced cannot be eaten. In addition, whisky and wine are also deeply loved by the Japanese. In addition to domestic wines, Japan also imports foreign wines, such as brandy and Maotai. The most popular drinks in Japan are green tea and black tea. Coffee is also deeply loved by modern Japanese, and oolong tea from China is also quite popular in Japan. Izakaya and izakaya are all over Japanese cities and villages. No matter how the times change, we will keep the same logo and style. Although the service has been improved a lot, its main function is to sell wine. The original izakaya is said to have come from the habit of standing and drinking in front of the hotel during the Edo period. At that time, because there was no bottled wine, guests usually brought their own containers. Later, with the hip flask, the shopkeeper lent the hip flask to regular customers and added the name of the shop to the hip flask, which was equivalent to advertising himself. At that time, farmers who came to work in Edo (now Tokyo) would come to the store for a drink after a busy day. Some bosses who know how to do business have added simple meals such as Japanese cuisine, soaked rice, rice balls and vegetable porridge to their stores, thus forming izakaya. Izakaya is characterized by its low price and unchanged style. All kinds of barbecues cost only 100 ~ 200 yen per string, as well as cocktails and drinks. Most of them are around 300 yen, and two people can't eat and drink more than 3,000 yen. Therefore, the average working class can accept it. The so-called constant is that the management of the owner, the decoration in the store, the atmosphere in the store and the people who come to drink every day rarely change. Once a drinker likes a shop, every day, like roll call, he usually shows up. Shops are like conveners, and drinkers are like members of this group. Especially in places where there were few tourists in the past, there were few new faces. Even if the father goes to the pub he is used to, the son will continue. Especially for some single men, izakaya feels at home. It is said that a good shop is an old one, so there is a Japanese saying called "unchanging izakaya". At present, Japanese catering has gradually diversified, and American fast food, hamburgers and pasta have partially replaced rice balls. Now, quick-frozen food is popular with housewives, and Chinese food such as jiaozi, fried dumpling, steamed stuffed bun and noodles are also very popular in Japan. Western snacks introduced from Europe to Japan, such as cakes, cookies, chaff melons, spring rolls, pot stickers, etc., which were introduced from China or evolved from vegetarian dishes in Zen temples, are also regarded as dishes by the Japanese, and they are very popular. In addition, the pace of Japanese society is very fast, so breakfast is very simple, lunch is more casual and dinner is extremely rich. Japanese people often eat red bean rice and snapper with the head and tail on every happy occasion. Add red beans to glutinous rice and steam together to make red bean rice. The color of red beans will turn glutinous rice red. Red symbolizes the color of fire and the sun, and has been regarded as an auspicious color since ancient times. The body of snapper is bright red, so it becomes a symbol of good luck. Japanese restaurants, like Japan's small territory, are generally small and crowded. The most common general restaurant or fast food restaurant has no distinction between "restaurant" and "kitchen" at all, but a tall, narrow and long counter-like table (mostly zigzag, some V-shaped or W-shaped) divides the whole room in two. Guests sit outside the table to eat and drink, and the shopkeeper cooks and takes care of the guests inside the table. Some restaurants are so-called Japanese (also called "tatami" style). There are no chairs here. The low tables are separated by partitions, and guests sit around the table when eating. A little more advanced is the single room, which is equivalent to the "private room" or box in China. Lucky cat. You can often see all kinds of lucky cats in front of Japanese restaurants and some shops. The story about the lucky cat happened in the early Edo period. A temple named Haode Temple was deserted. The abbot kept a cat and regarded it as his own flesh and blood. One day, the abbot listlessly said to the cat, "If you know that the temple is poor, please bring me some good luck." A few days later, Hideki Naoshi (1590 ~ 1659) and his family passed the gate of Haode Temple on their way home from hunting. When they saw a cat holding hands to meet them, they dismounted and went to the temple to rest. Just after receiving the tea party hosted by the abbot, there was a lot of thunder and little rain outside. The abbot preached for fear that everyone would get bored. After the rain stopped, Jing Yi said happily to the abbot, "The cat lured us in, rescued us from the thunderstorm, and was treated by the abbot to preach and teach us. This is probably a fate. " Later, under the protection of the Jing family, the incense flourished again in Haode Temple. The abbot's cat is called "Jade". After its death, the abbot built a tomb for it and asked someone to carve the idol of the cat, calling it a "lucky cat". Since then, many shops will put painted pottery lucky cats at the door or in the store. It holds a hand high and always greets guests with a serious face. The outstretched hand of a lucky cat can be divided into left and right hands. It is generally believed that holding up your left hand means luck; Raising your right hand is a blessing. If you use two lucky cats, one on the left and the other on the right, then "wealth" and "happiness" will double. There are also Japanese people who divide lucky cats into self-use and shop use, that is, the one who raises his left hand is used by shops to attract customers; Those who raise their right hand are for their own use, indicating that they are lucky. This is why businessmen will set up more lucky cats with their left hands held high in the shops.