Niangzaojiuchuantong Brewing Craftsmanship

01 · Historical Records

Danyang Fenggang wine is a high-grade variety of yellow wine, its lineage reaching back to the Qin and Han dynasties. It is called "fenggang" (sealed jar) because after brewing it is aged for a long time sealed in the jar, without opening another jar or starting over: from the moment a jar is filled until the wine can be drunk, the only thing in between is leaving time to the mouth of the jar.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

Fermented grain wine is commonly called "yellow wine" (huangjiu). It takes rice, broomcorn millet, corn and similar grains as raw materials. After washing, steaming and rinsing, white qu and yeast are used as saccharifying and fermenting agents; river qu and high-quality water are added, and after fermentation the mash (cloudy wine) is produced, which is then finished through pressing, settling and filtering. The wine is yellow in colour, clear and transparent, rich in aroma, and mild and mellow on the palate. Fermented grain wine is a traditional Chinese liquor, rich in nutrients, with effects such as promoting blood circulation, warming the stomach and intestines, moistening the skin, dispelling dampness, and nourishing and strengthening the body; it is especially loved by the people of Jiangnan. China is the birthplace of fermented grain wine. As early as the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, Shaoxing in Zhejiang could already brew yellow wine, a history of some 2,400 years to the present day. In the Jinhua region, during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, there also appeared the white lao wine brewed from glutinous rice and white smartweed qu. Fermented grain wine is mainly produced in Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Shanghai, among which the cities of Shaoxing and Jinhua in Zhejiang and Jintan in Jiangsu are the most famous. Yellow wine is the oldest liquor in China. Both the Danyang Fenggang wine and the Jintan Fenggang wine of Jiangsu Province are high-grade varieties of yellow wine, whose history can be traced back to the Qin and Han eras some two thousand years ago. Jintan is a land of fish and rice. The glutinous rice grown here has large, uniform grains, a fragrant taste and glutinous quality, and is white as jade; through the ages it was a tribute offered to the imperial court, and the production of fine glutinous rice created unique conditions for brewing Fenggang wine. The brewing technique of Danyang Fenggang wine is complex and demanding; the process requires long sealed-jar ageing, from which it takes its name. Once brewed, the wine is reddish-brown with an amber lustre, fragrant in aroma and full-bodied in taste, fresh, sweet and smooth on the palate, earning the praise "lighter than dew on the flowers, coloured like spring in a cave." Fenggang wine is made from special local glutinous rice and the Maoshan spring water, a yellow wine of highly distinctive flavour. Through the continuous efforts of craftsmen across generations, the Fenggang brewing technique has matured, forming a unique Fenggang wine culture, and is praised as "a marvel in the forest of wines." But as modern people's eating habits change, the market for sweet yellow wine has gradually shrunk, which has had a certain impact on the production of Fenggang wine.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

Danyang and Jintan both belong to the southern-Jiangsu sealed-jar wine line; both produce their own glutinous rice, with similar style but different water sources, and each master has his own knack and secret. Compared with the northern-Zhejiang yellow wine, this southern-Jiangsu branch places more value on the storage work after sealing the jar.

Other submitting regions for the same item: Niangzaojiuchuantong Brewing Craftsmanship · Niangzaojiuchuantong Brewing Craftsmanship · Niangzaojiuchuantong Brewing Craftsmanship · Niangzaojiuchuantong Brewing Craftsmanship.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

The Fenggang wine brewing technique is unique and of extremely high nutritional value; it is a famous local speciality of Jiangsu Province, enjoying a high reputation at home and abroad. The finished Fenggang wine (photo by Li Guoqiang) has extremely high nutritional and medicinal value, and has always been treasured by the world and favoured by consumers. Timely protection and transmission of the traditional Fenggang wine brewing technique has become an urgent task at present. Xu Chaozhong (per the official archives of the associated inheritor): male, Han ethnicity, born in August 1958, a native of Danyang City, Jiangsu Province. A representative inheritor of the third national-level batch of the intangible cultural heritage item "Traditional Brewing Technique of Fermented Grain Wine (Fenggang Wine Traditional Brewing Technique)." He entered the Danyang Winery in January 1981, learned from brewing veterans such as Qiu Weihan, and through his own long-term study and practice gained a thorough mastery of the Fenggang wine brewing technique, proficiently handling the entire production process. Under his direction, the Danyang Winery preserved the traditional brewing workshop, compiled a relatively complete set of process documentation, and also collected physical materials on traditional brewing utensils. He was appointed an expert committee member of the Yellow Wine Branch of the Chinese Institute of Food Science and Technology, an adjunct professor at Nanyang Institute of Technology in Henan, and an expert at the Chinese Yellow Wine Brewing Master Workshop, among other roles.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

• Xu Chaozhong 03-1416
• Wang Haoping 05-2839
• Lvminxiang 05-2840
• Chen Guanchang
• Li Zhongsheng

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

1. Niangzaojiuchuantong Brewing Craftsmanship (Danyang, Jiangsu) · China ICH Official Project Archive
2. Xu Chaozhong · National Representative Bearer Archive

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗