The Origin of Beef in Deng Ying

According to legend, Yuan Zhen, a famous poet in the Tang Dynasty, went to a restaurant for a drink one day when he was a Sima in Tongzhou (now Dachuan, Sichuan). A kind of beef slices on the dining table, ruddy and shiny, very pleasing to the eye, spicy and delicious. After eating, it is crispy and self-melting, with endless aftertaste, which makes Yuan Zhen amazed. To his surprise, this beef slice is extremely thin and translucent. When you lift it with chopsticks, the silk texture on the red beef slices will reflect a clear red image on the wall under the light, which is very interesting. He suddenly remembered the "shadow play" prevailing in Beijing at that time (now commonly known as shadow play, in which the silhouette of a character made of animal skins or cardboard is projected on the curtain with lights), which was so similar that he was called "shadow beef" as soon as he was in a mood. Therefore, this kind of beef in Dachuan has become a famous local product in Sichuan under the name of "Deng Ying Beef".

Deng Ying beef is unusual, and its ingredients and workmanship are very particular. After a cow is slaughtered, only a dozen pieces of leg meat and tenderloin can be taken, only a dozen kilograms. Slice the meat into thin slices with a long knife, add more than ten kinds of spices such as grass, cloves and tsaoko, mix well, spread the meat slices on a bamboo basket, expose them to the sun to remove moisture, put them in a special oven, control the humidity and bake them until they are cooked, put them in a bamboo tube or paper tube lined with oil paper, mix well with pure sesame oil, sprinkle a little pepper powder and seal them. According to records, during the Guangxu period of the Qing Dynasty, Liu Guangping, the owner of a restaurant in Guandaxi Street, Daxian County, made the most famous Deng Ying beef at that time. 1935, this hotel sent Deng Ying beef packed in bamboo tubes as a local specialty to Chengdu Qingyang Flower Expo for exhibition, and was rated as a first-class food.

At present, the main beef producing areas in Deng Ying are Daxian and Chongqing. The products of the two places are developing continuously and each has its own advantages. An American animal husbandry expert once said that Deng Ying beef is not only a delicious food, but also a wonderful handicraft. If the supply can be guaranteed, the price in the international market can be 4-5 times higher than the current export price. However, the production of beef in Deng Ying is limited by the shortage of raw materials.