The history of Hui cuisine in Shanghai is worth mentioning. Huiwei entered Shanghai in the early Qing Dynasty, and flourished for a time due to the development and growth of Huizhou merchants. In the Guangxu period, there were as many as three or four hundred Hui restaurants in Shanghai, and its glorious history lasted until the thirties of the twentieth century. With the rise of Cantonese cuisine and Sichuan cuisine and the Shanghainese people's pursuit of new trends, the old Hui cuisine gradually declined during the Republic of China and has been silent until now.
Hui cuisine is heavy on oil and salt, and the dishes are monotonous and the production is similar, so it is still a niche in Shanghai's catering industry. But Sun Zhaoguo, a celebrity chef from Anhui, believes that "mild corruption, heavy salt and lust" is just people's stereotype of Hui cuisine, Anhui has too many good ingredients because of its unique regional form, the mountain delicacies of southern Anhui, the river freshness in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are its advantages, and the mountain delicacies and wild game plus unique cooking techniques, Hui cuisine can become tall.
Wanyan on Hongqiao Road is a very stylish Hui restaurant. Anhui banquet does not stick to the routine of traditional Hui cuisine, but pays more attention to how to amplify the original taste of southern Anhui ingredients, combines the cooking techniques of traditional Hui cuisine with new concepts, and innovates the container and plating of dishes, and strives to make every Hui dish into a high-quality product. For example, in the dish of Huizhou Impression, the Huizhou ham is made in the way of making Dengying beef, combined with plum red ginseng and pickled river white fish, which is full of novelty and does not lose the flavor of Huizhou. The chicken and turtle soup is improved from the Huizhou dish "Jin Chicken and Horseshoe Turtle", which is made of the skirt of the soft-shelled turtle of the Yangtze River for more than five years, and the Huizhou old hen soup, Huizhou-style ham and winter bamboo shoots are added and stewed for six hours, and the soup made is crystal clear, but the fragrance is mellow. Huangshan Maofeng stewed yellow beef steak is made from grass-fed cattle from southern Anhui, colored with Qimen black tea, and the sauce is made from Huangshan Maofeng with olive oil, this dish is not only meaty, but also fragrant and greasy. Stinky mandarin fish adopts the traditional method, smelling and eating fragrant. In fact, during the pickling process, mandarin fish not only produces a large amount of glutamic acid and valine with umami, but also the appearance of trace nucleotides and organic acids will greatly improve the freshness of the fish. In addition, the southern Anhui mountain treasures, the Huangshan double stone, the knife plate incense, the crab roe and tofu stewed puffer fish treasure, the Yangtze River catfish stewed loofah, and the Yangtze River frozen eel are all selected from the best ingredients and carefully made, interested diners can go to the Anhui banquet to dig one by one.
The decoration of the Anhui banquet is worthy of its name, it does feel like a dinner party, very gorgeous, slightly exaggerated for the Huizhou restaurant, but it also integrates typical Huizhou elements, such as the door of the Anhui banquet is modeled on the white walls and black tiles of southern Anhui, and the interior also imitates the decoration of the "bell bottle mirror" (lifelong peace) in the Huangmei opera "Huizhou Past". The service of the banquet is impeccable, the waitress dressed in foreign style on both sides of the door after the diners enter the door will bow and salute, and then someone will guide the diners to take their seats, the waiter will send free fruits before the meal, and the food is added to the table without slackness, the waiter shows people with a smile and speaks softly throughout the whole process, and the diner's dining experience is very good.