Chinese Noodles - History

History

The earliest written record of noodles is from a book dated to the Eastern Han Dynasty period (25–220). Noodles, often made from wheat dough, became a prominent staple of food during the Han Dynasty (206 BCE - 220 CE). During the Song Dynasty (960–1279) noodle shops were very popular in the cities, and remained open all night. During the earlier dynastic periods Chinese wheat noodles were known as "soup cake" (湯餅), as explained by the Song Dynasty scholar Huang Chaoying (黃朝英) mentions in his work "A delightful mixed discussion on various scholarly topics" (Chinese: 靖康緗素雜記; pinyin: jìngkāngxiāngsùzájì, Scroll 2) that in ancient times dough foods are referred collectively as "bing" and differentiated through their cooking methods.

In 2002, archaeologists found an earthenware bowl containing world's oldest known noodles, 4000 years old, at the Lajia archaeological site of the Qijia culture along the Yellow River in China. The noodles were well-preserved. After research with parts of the noodle remains in 2004, scientists determined that the noodles were made from foxtail millet and broomcorn millet. The findings were published in October 2005 by Houyuan Lu et al. in the journal Nature.