On a bamboo mat, rice, millet, red beans, wheat and sorghum fill baskets and sacks beside braised pork, lamb ribs, roast chicken and sliced beef, while someone ladles from a pot of hot porridge over charcoal.
The growing of the five grains and raising of the six domestic animals, the two supports of farming life, supplying grain, meat, eggs and animal power, and the source of later cooking.
7400 BCE · OriginRice remains about 9,400 years old at Shangshan, Zhejiang show rice domestication under way, with northern millets and domestic animals following.800 BCE · EvolutionZhou texts already summed up the staple crops and livestock as the 'five grains' and 'six animals', and the Rites of Zhou assigned officials to the six animals.540 · ImpactJia Sixie's Qimin yaoshu of the Northern Wei systematically recorded crop cultivation and animal husbandry, giving the five grains and six animals a complete agronomic system.
"Five grains" and "six animals" are two very old phrases. Zhou texts already used them to sum up the main crops and domestic animals, and the Rites of Zhou assigned officials to manage the six animals. The ingredients on today's table go far beyond what those two phrases name, so this class is divided by ingredient into seven branches: rice, millet and other grains, introduced crops, pork, beef and mutton, poultry and eggs, and dairy foods.
On the grain side, rice is usually sorted into indica, japonica and glutinous rice, and is mostly cooked as rice or congee, with glutinous rice also made into rice cakes and sweet dumplings. Millet and other grains means the dryland cereals: foxtail millet, broomcorn millet, sorghum, barley, oats, buckwheat and highland barley. They are mostly cooked as porridge or rice, or ground into flour and steamed as wotou cones, and sorghum and millet are also used for brewing. Introduced crops are the grains, vegetables and fruits that came in one after another from the Ming on, such as maize, sweet potatoes, peanuts and chilli peppers, of which peanuts and chilli peppers originated in the Americas.
On the meat side, pork covers different breeds and cuts as well as blood and offal, and names vary by place; pig's blood, for example, is called zhuhong in Guangdong and Hong Kong and mostly xuedoufu in the mainland. Mutton is often swished in a boiling pot or roasted, beef may be swished, stewed or stir-fried, and halal cooking uses no pork. Poultry and eggs covers the meat of chicken, duck and goose and all kinds of eggs, including salted eggs and preserved eggs. Dairy foods are made from the milk of cattle, sheep, horses and other animals, such as butter, milk skin and milk curds, and they hold an important place in the herding regions of the Mongol, Tibetan and Kazakh peoples. Finished dishes such as roast duck belong to the regional cuisines.
Grains & Livestock is the overview class for staple ingredients in the chapter on the Cuisine. It gathers the main foods of the everyday table: rice, millet and other grains, pork, beef and mutton, poultry and eggs, crops introduced since the Ming, and dairy foods. It deals with the ingredients themselves; the finished dishes made from them belong to the regional cuisines.
Crops and domestic animals entered the human diet one after another. The branches appeared at different times, and what follows is in order of date.
Rice remains about 9,400 years old at Shangshan in Zhejiang show that rice domestication was under way, and the rice found there differs from wild rice. In the north, millets and domestic animals followed: the millet found at the Cishan site in Hebei is more than 8,000 years old, and millet is generally thought to have originated in the Yellow River valley; at Jiahu, Cishan and other sites, bones with the features of domestic pigs have been found, about 8,500 years old.
Bones of domestic chickens found at Yinxu in Anyang are about 3,300 years old. Zhou texts already used "five grains" and "six animals" to sum up the main crops and domestic animals, and the Rites of Zhou assigned officials to the six animals.
Jia Sixie's Qimin yaoshu of the Northern Wei (about 540) recorded in detail how to grow crops and raise animals, treating grain and livestock in the same farming manual. The Yuan-dynasty Yinshan zhengyao, in its section on animal foods, already lists butter and curd made from cow's and sheep's milk.
From the Ming onward, introduced crops came in one after another. According to a review by China News Service, maize is clearly recorded from 1560 (the thirty-ninth year of the Jiajing reign), sweet potatoes arrived around the 1570s and 1580s, and the dates for peanuts and chilli peppers are still disputed. An entry from Guizhou in 1721 says that people there used chilli pepper in place of salt.
These dates come from different sites and texts and do not join into one line, so this class is divided by ingredient and not arranged by date.
Shijing Millets
The Zhou-era scholar at lower left reads a bamboo-slip Shijing while millet, sorghum, hemp, and wheat grow in ridges behind him, showing the highly mature Zhou agricultural knowledge.
Iron Plow
The Han-dynasty iron plow at center-left, drawn by two oxen, opens deep furrows and roughly doubles per-mu yield.
Qimin Yaoshu
The North Wei Jia Sixie at center reads a silk-copy Qimin Yaoshu, with eighty-six millet varieties and seed-selection tools beside him, China's oldest complete agricultural manual.
Tang Curved Plow
The Tang-dynasty curved-shaft plow at center-right, contrasted with the older straight-shaft plow, greatly boosted southern paddy-field efficiency.
Champa Rice
The Song-era farmer at center-right holds up a Champa-rice earhead, with the Taihu basin rice-paddy wave and Jiangzhe farmhouses behind him.
Nongzheng Quanshu
The Ming-era Xu Guangqi at lower right reads the Nongzheng Quanshu at his desk, beside him piled farm tools, rice seed, and irrigation charts, the synthesis of Chinese agricultural knowledge.
A market displays the five grains in piled sacks and the six livestock at separate stalls, while traders haggle and rows of storage jars stand ready, celebrating agricultural abundance. The dual agricultural matrix of flora and fauna establishing the resource baseline.
Grains & Livestock is like the grain bin and the animal pen standing side by side in a farmyard: the bin holds rice and millet, the pen holds pigs, cattle, sheep and poultry, one gives grain and the other meat, and with both the table is complete.
Rice remains about 9,400 years old at Shangshan in Zhejiang show that rice domestication was under way; Zhou texts sum up crops and domestic animals as the "five grains" and "six animals"; and the Northern Wei Qimin yaoshu records how to grow crops and raise animals.
After the autumn harvest, a farm family sat in the yard and counted up the year's yield.
The grandfather pointed to the grain bin in the corner and said that the rice and the millet were both in store, so the porridge and rice for the coming months were settled. The grandson ran to the back yard, looked at the pigs in their pen and at the chickens and ducks in their coop, and came back to say that there was meat for the New Year too. His mother brought out a bowl of new rice and a dish of stewed meat and said: grain fills the stomach, meat adds flavour, and we need both.
The grandfather nodded and told the boy that when spring came he should set the seed aside before anything else and then see to matters in the pen. The boy answered yes, and reached for the meat.
Crops and domestic animals entered human life very early. Rice remains about 9,400 years old at Shangshan in Zhejiang show that rice domestication was under way, the millet found at Cishan in Hebei is more than 8,000 years old, the pig bones with domestic features from Jiahu, Cishan and other sites are about 8,500 years old, and the chicken bones from Yinxu are about 3,300 years old. Zhou texts sum up the main crops and domestic animals as the "five grains" and "six animals". (This is an illustrative story, not a historical account.)
Dairy FoodsSolid and semi-solid foods made from the milk of cattle, sheep, horses and other animals, such as butter and milk skin.
RiceRice as a grain, its main kinds, and the plain rice and congee cooked from it.
Millets and Other GrainsMillets, sorghum, barley, oats, buckwheat and the other grains eaten as staples.
Introduced CropsMaize, sweet potato, potato, peanut, chili and other crops that came to China later.
PorkPigs as food: breeds, cuts, blood and offal.
Beef and MuttonBeef, mutton, lamb, goat and yak meat, with their breeds and cuts.
Poultry and EggsChicken, duck, goose and other poultry, with their eggs and egg products.