脯：一條肉怎麼曬乾、怎麼吃

參考來源與延伸閱讀

1. 《齐民要术》卷第八·脯腊第七十五（北魏贾思勰；维基文库本，未与点校本复核） — The whole dry-curing chapter. Five-flavour dried meat: 'the first, second, ninth and tenth months are best' (正月、二月、九月、十月為佳); meats 'beef, mutton, zhang, deer, wild boar and domestic pig, cut into strips or slices' (或作條，或作片), always with the grain; bone broth, fermented beans, then 'salt — to taste only, do not let it be too salty' (鹽，適口而已，勿使過鹹), scallion white pounded, 'pepper, ginger and orange peel all powdered, as much as needed' (椒、薑、橘皮，皆末之，量多少); steep and 'knead through with the hand' (手揉令徹); 'slices come out after three nights, strips when you taste the flavour has gone through' (片脯三宿則出，條脯須嘗看味徹乃出); string them and dry in shade under the north eave; press strips firm while damp; keep in a quiet store, 'smoke makes the taste bitter', 'paper bag and hang — in a jar it sweats, unbagged it takes flies and dust' (紙袋籠而懸之); twelfth-month strips are 'chill-cured' (瘃脯) and keep through summer; 'take the fat first, fat is greasy and does not keep' (先取其肥者). White dried meat for summer: twelfth month best, first to third also possible; lean flesh, cold-water soak and wring until clear, clear white brine with pepper, two nights, shade-dry, 'tap lightly with a stick to firm it, firm only, do not let shreds come out' (僅使堅實而已，慎勿令碎肉出). Sweet fat dried meat: twelfth month, zhang and deer, slices as thick as a palm, shade-dried 'with no salt', 'crisp as snow'. Snakehead dried meat: eleventh month to end of twelfth, unscaled and unopened, a stick thrust mouth to tail, extremely salty brine with ginger and pepper poured into the mouth, bamboo through the eyes, 'ten to a string' (十箇一貫), hung under the north eave through winter, done by the second or third month, eaten raw with sour vinegar or roasted in mud and embers until 'white as snow'. Five-flavour cured meat: twelfth month, birds and fish, steeped 'four or five days'; crisp cured meat: twelfth month, boiled then shade-dried; damp-salted fish: any season. The same juan's meat-paste recipe is exact by contrast (one dou meat, five sheng koji powder, two and a half sheng white salt, one sheng yellow steamed wheat), which is why the absence of figures in the dried-meat methods is a fact about this chapter, not about the book.
2. 《礼记·内则》（维基文库本，未与点校本复核） — The ritual menu. The list of dried meats: 'beef strips, dried deer, dried wild boar, dried mi, dried jun; mi, jun, deer and wild boar each had their xuan, pheasant and hare their mao' (牛脩、鹿脯、田豕脯、麋脯、麕脯……雉、兔皆有芼). The pairings: 'wheat food with dried-meat soup and chicken soup' (麥食、脯羹、雞羹); 'sliced dried meat with ant-egg paste; dried-meat soup with rabbit paste; elk skin with fish paste; fish slices with mustard sauce' (腶脩，蚳醢；脯羹，兔醢……). The rank rule: 'a grand officer at an ordinary meal has either minced meat or dried meat, not both' (大夫燕食，有膾無脯，有脯無膾), followed by 'a shi does not have two soups and two cuts' and 'commoners' elders do not eat bare'. The seasonal line: 'in summer, dried meat and dried fish are fitting, with rank-smelling fat' (夏宜腒鱐，膳膏臊). The page is text without commentary: it does not gloss xiu, xuan, mao, hai, ju or su, and gives no method, salt quantity or day count anywhere.