Ants climbing a tree is a Sichuan dish, which is made by stir-frying minced meat and vermicelli with spicy seasonings. The fried minced meat and tender vermicelli soaked in spicy seasonings fully demonstrate the aroma of Sichuan cuisine. Spicy and delicious.
It is named because the minced meat is as small as ants distributed on the vermicelli, just like ants climbing a tree. And because the main ingredients of "Ants on the Tree" are minced meat and vermicelli, it is also commonly known as "minced meat vermicelli". According to legend, its origin is also related to Dou E, the goddess of snow in June.
There was a Dou E in Chuzhou who lost his mother when he was three years old. His father Dou Tianzhang was a poor scholar. In order to take the exam in Beijing, he sold the seven-year-old Dou E to the creditor Granny Cai as a child bride to pay off the debt. , Secondly, Dou E was also taken care of. Grandma Cai, who lost her husband early in life, had a son. She saw that Dou E was well-behaved, so she planned to let them grow up and get married, so she adopted Dou Mo.
Ten years later, Dou E changed from a child bride to the daughter-in-law of the Cai family. She lived a loving life with her husband for two or three years. Unfortunately, her husband died of illness soon after, and her sad mother-in-law also followed. Fallen ill.
In order to cure her mother-in-law's illness, Dou E did not hesitate to spend a lot of money, seek famous doctors and use noble medicinal materials. In order to nurse her mother-in-law's body, Dou E also had delicious meals for three meals. The condition is getting better day by day, but it has also exhausted the family's wealth, and the family's expenses are also in trouble.
But in order for her mother-in-law to eat meat and recover as soon as possible, Dou E had no choice but to look down and go to the meat stall to get credit. The butcher said: "The money you owed the last two times has not been paid off, and you can't owe it on credit today." Dou E had no choice but to beg her again and again, but the butcher had no choice but to give her only a small piece of meat.
Dou E was looking at the small piece of meat and was thinking about how to cook it when she accidentally saw a handful of vermicelli in the cupboard, so she suddenly had the idea to soak the handful of vermicelli in water until soft. After swelling, patiently cut the small pieces of meat into small pieces, add some green onions, ginger, chili and soy sauce and stir-fry, and it becomes a large plate of fragrant fried vermicelli, which was hurriedly served to the mother-in-law on the hospital bed.
My mother-in-law asked: "What are you cooking that is so fragrant?" Dou E replied: "Fried vermicelli, eat it while it's hot!" Before the dim-sighted mother-in-law used her chopsticks, she saw many ant-like things on the vermicelli. There were little black spots, and her mother-in-law asked: "How come there are ants on these fans?" Dou E burst into tears with grievance: "My daughter-in-law is unfilial! In order to treat her mother-in-law's illness and take care of her health, she spent all the family's wealth. She only had meat because she had no money to buy it. I was able to get a small piece of meat on credit, cut into tiny pieces, which looked like small black dots of ants, which frightened my mother-in-law!”
When my mother-in-law understood the reason, she hurriedly used her chopsticks to taste it! She took a sip and said: "I am such a filial daughter-in-law, be good and don't cry! For such delicious stir-fried vermicelli, let's call it 'ants climbing the tree'!" Dou E burst into tears and laughed: "Yeah! That's a good call! It really looks like an ant climbing a tree! Let's call it 'ant climbing a tree'!