DONGJING MENG HUA LU / 卷四
食店
Twenty bowls, one arm.
The restaurant row ran on protocol. A checker with the order pad questioned every diner; the runner chanted the order back to the kitchen post; minutes later he came out with three bowls on his left hand and some twenty stacked up his right arm — and every bowl landed where its caller sat. One mistake cost a scolding, a wage fine, or the job.
FOLLOW THE ORDER ↓One market, four menus.
The entry's first move is taxonomy: great 分茶 houses, Sichuan houses, southern-food houses and the gourd-soup theaters. Each class carries its own dish list, quoted below in the entry's order.
分茶
The largest houses, named for their portioned-tea service — the full dinner taxonomy of the capital.
川飯店
Regional cooking as a shop class — the Sichuan houses and their noodle-and-rice list.
南食店
The southern-food houses — a short list, fish-forward, three items named.
瓠羹店
The gourd-soup houses put the kitchen on the street: timber frames bound like a mountain gate, whole pigs and sheep hung in rows.
Five moves from seat to bowl.
The service protocol as the entry stages it, in order. Nothing here is inferred: each move is the text's own verb.
Every shop keeps halls, courtyards and east-west galleries with called places — 每店各有廳院東西廊稱呼坐次.
One person with the order paper goes around every diner — 遍問坐客 — because no two callers want the same thing.
The runner takes the calls, stands by the kitchen, and chants them down the line from the top — 從頭唱念，報與局內.
The one at the pass — 當局者 — is the 鐺頭, also called 著案. The kitchen hears the whole room at once.
Minutes later the runner lands every bowl at its caller — three on the left hand, some twenty stacked up the right arm, no errors permitted.
Bowls carried on the left hand — 左手杈三碗.
Bowls stacked from wrist to shoulder — 右臂自手至肩馱疊約二十碗.
One mistake and the diner reports it to the owner: a scolding, a wage fine, or dismissal — 必加叱罵，或罰工價，甚者逐之.
1. Four houses, four menus.
大凡食店，大者謂之「分茶」，則有頭羹、石髓羹、白肉、胡餅、軟羊、大小骨角、炙犒腰子、石肚羹、入爐羊罨、生軟羊麵、桐皮麵、薑潑刀、回刀、冷淘、棋子、寄爐麵飯之類。吃全茶，饒齏頭羹。更有川飯店，則有插肉麵、大燠麵、大小抹肉淘、煎燠肉、雜煎事件、生熟燒飯。更有南食店：魚兜子、桐皮熟膾麵、煎魚飯。
In food shops generally, the largest were called 分茶 houses, and their list ran to head soups, marrow soups, plain meat, hu-bing, soft lamb, large and small bone cuts, roast kidney, stone-belly soup, oven-baked lamb, fresh soft-wheat noodles, tongpi noodles, ginger-splash knife cuts, return cuts, cold-washed noodles, chess-piece pasta, and hearth-rice dishes. A full tea service came first, with a bonus of soup. There were also Sichuan houses: meat-insert noodles, big braised noodles, large and small minced-meat broth, fried braised meat, mixed fried items, raw and cooked rice. And southern-food houses: fish-pouch dumplings, tongpi fresh-cut noodles, fried-fish rice.
The taxonomy is regional as well as economic: a capital market that sorted itself into great houses, a Sichuan cuisine, a southern cuisine and a soup-house street theater. The dish lists are the entry's own — the page keeps them whole, in order, rather than excerpting. Note the single price-free sentence about service style: 吃全茶，饒齏頭羹, the full tea service with a bonus soup.
2. The house performs before it serves.
又有瓠羹店，門前以枋木及花樣礬結縛如山棚，上掛成邊豬羊，相間三二十邊。近裏門面窗戶，皆朱綠裝飾，謂之「歡門」。每店各有廳院東西廊稱呼坐次。客坐，則一人執箸紙，遍問坐客。都人侈縱，百端呼索，或熱或冷，或溫或整，或絕冷、精澆、膘澆之類，人人索喚不同。行菜得之，近局次立，從頭唱念，報與局內。當局者謂之「鐺頭」，又曰「著案」訖。
There were also gourd-soup houses, their fronts framed in timber and patterned alum bound like a mountain gate, whole dressed pigs and sheep hung on top, twenty to thirty in alternation. The inner doors and windows were dressed in red and green — the 歡門. Every shop kept halls and courtyards, east and west galleries, with places called by name. Once guests were seated, one person with the order paper went around questioning every diner. The capital's people were extravagant and unrestrained, calling for a hundred things — hot or cold, warm or whole, chilled, fine-topped, fat-topped — every caller different. The runner took it all, stood close by the kitchen, chanted it from the top, and reported it inside. The one at the post was the 鐺頭, also called 著案.
The gourd-soup house is a stage built of food: the storefront is meat architecture — whole carcasses as signage, in counts of twenty and thirty. Inside, service is protocol, not charm. The relay exists because demand is individual by design (人人索喚不同): temperature, topping and cut are all caller's choice. The chant is the technology that carries a hundred individual orders to one kitchen post without paper.
3. Twenty bowls, no errors — ten cash a bowl.
須臾，行菜者左手杈三碗、右臂自手至肩馱疊約二十碗，散下盡合各人呼索，不容差錯。一有差錯，坐客白之主人，必加叱罵，或罰工價，甚者逐之。吾輩入店，則用一等琉璃淺稜碗，謂之「碧碗」，亦謂之「造羹」，菜蔬精細，謂之「造齏」，每碗十文。麵與肉相停，謂之「合羹」；又有「單羹」，乃半箇也。舊只用匙，今皆用箸矣。更有插肉、撥刀、炒羊、細物料、棋子、餛飩店。及有素分茶，如寺院齋食也。又有菜麵、蝴蝶齏胳，及賣隨飯、荷包、白飯、旋切細料餶飿兒、瓜齏、蘿蔔之類。
In moments the runner had three bowls forked on his left hand and some twenty stacked from wrist to shoulder up his right arm, and he set them down matching every caller's demand — no error permitted. If one occurred, the diner reported it to the owner: a scolding for certain, or a fine docked from wages, or dismissal. When we go into a shop, we use a grade of glass-rimmed shallow-ribbed bowl called a 碧碗 — what it holds is called 造羹, and when the vegetables are fine-cut, 造齏 — at ten cash a bowl. Noodles and meat in equal parts made 合羹; there was also 單羹, half of that. In the past only spoons were used; now all use chopsticks. There were further meat-insert, badao, fried-mutton, fine-dressed and chess-piece shops, and wonton shops; also vegetarian 分茶, like monastery refectory food; and vegetable noodles, húdié soups and the rest, with rice-accompaniment sales, purses, plain rice, fresh-cut fine-dressed dumplings, melon pickle and radish.
The relay ends in arithmetic: twenty bowls balanced against a zero-error rule, enforced through the diner himself. Then the entry drops to street level and prices the ordinary bowl — 每碗十文 — and files a small revolution in two clauses: spoons then, chopsticks now. The section closes by exhausting the market's tail: wonton shops, vegetarian houses, vegetable noodles — a taxonomy so complete it ends in radish.
Where the witnesses divide.
Gutenberg omits 炙; the Siku transcription prints a corrupt glyph; the simplified cross-check prints 炙. Two of three witnesses support it, and the page includes it with the spread recorded.
Gutenberg's line breaks at 旋切細料??兒 — an OCR gap. The Siku witness prints 餶飿兒; the simplified cross-check agrees. The page adopts the Siku reading.
Two spots resist all witnesses: the 蝴蝶 food name ends 胳 in Gutenberg but 肐 plus an entity-encoded character in the Siku transcription; 花樣礬 prints differently in all three witnesses. The page keeps the Gutenberg forms and leaves both open.
The largest food shops, named for portioned-tea service.
The soup house with a butchered storefront — the street theater of the row.
Red-and-green dressed doors and windows; Entry 13 saw the same term on the wine houses.
He queries, chants, carries twenty bowls and lands them without error.
The kitchen post that receives the chant — the one at the board.
Ten cash a bowl — the page's one street-level price.
Entry 36 is Volume IV's largest section because eating out was the city's largest habit. The page reads it as machinery — a taxonomy of houses, a relay of pad and chant and post, a body built for twenty bowls — priced, at the bottom, at ten cash a bowl. The restaurants Entry 13 named as institutions here acquire their floor staff.
散下盡合各人呼索，不容差錯。The protocol is textual. Two characters stay open.
The primary text is read against the Siku-family witness (Kanripo KR2k0111) and the Gutenberg transcription #24137, with a simplified digitization as cross-check only. The restored 炙, the Siku-filled 餶飿兒 and the two unresolved characters are kept visible in the collation panel.