Kongfucaipengrenjiyi
01 · Historical Records
The history of Kong Family Cuisine can be traced back to 272 BCE, transmitted unbroken through successive dynasties with continuous innovation. By the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Kong Family Cuisine had formed a culinary system with a style all its own in colour, aroma, taste, shape, vessel, and conception.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Kong Family Cuisine is a distinctive official-family culinary system formed by the descendants of Confucius over long practice in daily life. Embodying Confucius's dietary idea that "one does not mind refined food, nor mind finely minced meat," it condenses the character and depth of Confucian culture and is a treasure of Chinese food culture rich in connotation and artistic quality. Kong Family Cuisine uses a wide range of ingredients, works with refined craftsmanship, excels at seasoning, and pays attention to its serving vessels; its cooking techniques are comprehensive and its preparation procedures complex. Among its many techniques, it is especially accomplished in roasting, stir-frying, simmering, braising, deep-frying, and stewing. Its flavour is characterized by lightness, freshness, tenderness, and a soft, mellow, aromatic richness. Its serving vessels and dining tables and chairs are especially luxurious, ingenious, and exquisitely crafted; the imperially bestowed "Manchu–Han Full Banquet" alone comprises 404 pieces of silver tableware.
Braise, stir-fry, simmer, roast, deep-fry and pot-roast
These six methods are the strength of Kongfu cooking, resting on wide ingredients and refined seasoning to give a light, tender, mellow flavour.
The insistence on serving vessels
Vessels and tables were part of the dish; among them the 404 pieces of silver plate bestowed for the Manchu-Han feast show the craft.
Mandarin fish playing with the moon
One of the dishes the inheritor learned from the Kongfu chef Ge Shoutian, a favourite among the several dozen Kongfu dishes he cooks.
The compilation of the Kongfu Recipe Book
The inheritor co-edited the Kongfu Recipe Book and wrote papers on its legends and formation, turning kitchen practice into writing.
Never sated with fine food, never weary of thin cuts
The Kongfu kitchen follows this ideal of Confucius, reaching by the late nineteenth century a cuisine distinctive in colour, aroma, taste, form, vessels and idea.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The craft centre of Kong Family Cuisine is the Kong Family Mansion in Qufu. Within the mansion there is its own complete kitchen staff, while outside the mansion the culinary front is carried by chefs from the Qufu area. In history, the Kong Family Mansion shared in the fortune of the state, with unceasing gifts and exchanges and constant festival banquets, making its banquet procedures and vessel arrangements stable. Peng Wenyu entered the kitchen at the age of twenty and later studied under Ge Shoutian, a famed Kong Mansion chef, inheriting this line's rules of heat control and seasoning. Today he has thirty-six directly transmitted disciples and has trained over ten thousand students.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The formation of Kong Family Cuisine not only directly influenced the formation of the Shandong (Lu) branch among China's four great culinary systems; owing to the Kong Family Mansion's historical political and economic status of "sharing in the fortune of the state," Kong Family Cuisine not only absorbed the character of court cuisine but also gathered the essence of local cuisines from across the country. It holds important historical significance and contemporary value for enriching Chinese food culture, preserving and studying Chinese culinary technique and its historical evolution, enriching the connotation of Confucian culture, and expanding the external influence of Confucian culture. Peng Wenyu (per official archive of the associated inheritor): Male, Han ethnicity, born February 1955, a native of Qufu City, Shandong Province. Representative inheritor of the fifth national-level batch of the intangible cultural heritage item "Kong Family Cuisine Cooking Technique." Cooking technician of Kong Family Cuisine. Began learning the culinary arts at the age of twenty and later studied under Ge Shoutian, a famed Kong Mansion chef, deeply grasping the essence of Kong Family Cuisine technique; the dozens of Kong Family dishes he prepares, such as "Mandarin Fish Playing with the Moon," are greatly favoured by customers. Over many years he has remained on the front line of culinary practice, participated multiple times in domestic and international culinary technical exchange activities, and prepared Kong Family Cuisine for leaders of several countries. He has delved into culinary theory, co-edited the "Kong Family Cuisine Recipe Book," and authored several papers including "Legends of Kong Family Cuisine" and "The Formation, Characteristics, and Development of Kong Family Cuisine." Devoted to the inheritance and development of Kong Family Cuisine cooking technique, he now has thirty-six directly transmitted disciples and has trained over ten thousand students.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Peng Wenyu 05-2887
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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