Shanfujing shoulu 膳夫經手錄

Shanfujing shoulu 膳夫經手錄 "Hand-recorded book of the chef", briefly Shanfujin 膳夫經, is a book on diet written during the Tang period by Yang Ye 楊曄, who was district magistrate (xianling 縣令) of Chaoxian 巢縣.

The book was finished in 856 and had an original size of 4 juan, of which only one fascicle survives. It is included in the series Wanwei biecang 宛委別藏, Yueyatang congshu 粵雅堂叢書 and Congshu jicheng chubian 叢書集成初編.

The fragmentary text has a volume of 1,500 words. It is divided into sections and similar categories, starting with grains and cereals, and then briefly describing the names, places of origin, processing and eating methods, and curative effects of "barbarian beans" (ludou 虜豆), sesame (huma 胡麻), Job's tears (yiyi 薏苡), yam (shuyao 薯藥), and taro (yutao 芋頭). The next section describes vegetables such as "cinnamon heart" (guixin 桂心, the inner part of the bark), radish (luobo 蘿卜), Artemisia selengensis (louhao 蔞蒿), alfalfa or Medicago (muxu 苜蓿), "thorny knots" (cijie 刺結 ?), Monochoria korsakowii (shuikui 水葵), fungi (mu'er 木耳, xunzi 菌子) and eatable parts of the large-fruited elm (wuyi 蕪荑). Then there is a section on meat such as sheep, quail, Mandarin ducks, eel (man 鰻), sole (li 鯏), shark (sha 鯊), etc., followed by two kinds of fruits, namely cherries and loquats (pipa 枇杷).

After that, the text describes the origin of tea and its varieties, flavours and places of production in more detail. This section has a length of more than 900 words and thus accounts for nearly two-thirds of the text. and then it goes on to talk about minced meat (kuai 膾), and closes with cooked food, with dishes like butuo 不托 (i.e., botuo 餺飥 noodle soup), gluten slices (qie mianjin 切麵筋), "seizable" congee (jiazhou 夾粥), Brasenia congee (chunzhou 蒓粥) and mutton.

Although the text survives only in fragments, it is all the more precious in view of the fact that most Tang-period books on food and diet have been lost.