Douchiniangzhijiyi
01 · Historical Records
Douchi brewing has a long history in China; records of douchi making already appear in the 'Qimin Yaoshu' (Essential Techniques for the Welfare of the People) of the Northern and Southern dynasties period. According to the 'Sanxiang County Annals,' in the ninth year of the Kangxi reign of the Qing dynasty (1670), the Qiu family migrated from Jiangxi and settled in Tongchuan Prefecture (present-day Santai County).
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Douchi is a healthy food with effects such as lowering blood lipids, resisting aging, preventing cancer, and enhancing human immunity, and is deeply loved by people. It uses high-quality black soybeans as the main raw material, with five-spice, star anise, and other Chinese medicinal herbs and spices as auxiliary materials, made through processes such as fermentation, steaming, mold-washing, aroma enhancement, and dehydration. Douchi can be divided into three types: Mucor-type, Aspergillus-oryzae-type, and bacterial-type, of which the Mucor-type is the best. China's douchi-brewing craft mainly spreads in Sichuan, Hunan, and Chongqing. Tongchuan douchi is the most famous local specialty of Santai County, Sichuan Province, with a history of over three hundred years to this day. The Qiu family adopts a Mucor-koji-making process to brew brightly colored, delicious douchi, and continuously improves the technique according to Santai's climate and water quality, giving the douchi-brewing craft a unique style and making the product ever more delicious. Because this douchi was produced in Tongchuan, it is called 'Tongchuan douchi.' In the seventeenth year of the Kangxi reign (1678), the prefect of Tongchuan presented it as a tribute, making Tongchuan douchi famous in the capital. When it passed to the fifth-generation Qiu family member Qiu Zhengshun, he opened the Zhengshunhao sauce garden on East Street in the city, producing over two hundred thousand jin of douchi annually.
Mucor mould koji making
The decisive step that distinguishes Tongchuan douchi from Aspergillus and bacterial types, growing a white Mucor layer over the black soybean base.
Steaming and washing the mould
The beans are steamed, then washed to keep only the mycelial film; too much washing loses the aroma, too little lets the batch rot.
The five-spice and star-anise seasoning
Black soybean is the base, with five-spice, star anise and medicinal aromatics added in measured, staged doses.
Aroma building and drying
After washing, the beans are sunned and turned to drive off moisture; the depth of each layer and the timing of turning decide whether the final product crumbles or sets hard.
Batching at Zhengshun pickle garden
The fifth generation opened Zhengshun pickle garden on East Street, turning a household workshop into a concern producing over two hundred thousand jin a year.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The technical foundation of Tongchuan douchi is Mucor-type koji-making, a lineage most prevalent in the Sichuan-Guizhou area, whereas the sauce-fermented douchi of the middle and lower Yangtze and Lingnan mostly follow the Aspergillus-oryzae type, with the bacterial type being a minority. The Mucor type relies on hyphae crawling over the surface of the mash to form a frost-like layer; the mold-washing step is precisely to keep this fungal film while rinsing away contaminating microbes—wash too hard and it turns bland and loses aroma, wash too lightly and it smells foul and grows spots. Santai's cold winters, humid summers, and long-lasting fog happen to sustain the Mucor hyphae, but also force the sunning-and-dehydration timing to flex with the climate; this is also the origin of the Qiu family's adapting its koji and timing to local soil and water. From the sales route's perspective, Tongchuan douchi spread toward Chengdu, Chongqing, and the Shaanxi-Gansu line in response to demand for Sichuan-cuisine seasonings; diners outside Sichuan mostly encountered this item through dried-goods shops, sauce-garden storefronts, and market vendors. In former times Santai was a key land-and-water junction in northern Sichuan, with frequent traffic at docks and post stations; sauce gardens set up shops along the streets, supplying both restaurants and post-kitchens and also retailing over the counter. To test a dish of douchi, Sichuan people first look at whether the color is bright, then smell for the mellow aroma of fermentation, and only last taste the saltiness.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Douchiniangzhijiyi.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
Tongchuan douchi is highly nutritious; it can promote hematopoietic function and is easily absorbed by the human body, making it a natural nutritional health product. Tongchuan douchi is of excellent quality, but because it is hand-brewed, with high costs and long cellar-aging cycles, it is quite difficult to sustain production in today's fiercely competitive market; it is necessary to formulate corresponding measures to strengthen the protection of its traditional brewing craft.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Cengfanyu 05-2856
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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