Hakka intangible Cultural Heritage —— manual oil pressing technology

1.origin

The mountainous area of southern Jiangxi is rich in camellia oil. According to it, during the Northern Zhou Dynasty (557-581 AD), a Zhao carpenter who migrated from the Central Plains to southern Jiangxi found that a perennial green camellia tree grew everywhere on the mountains of southern Jiangxi, and its nuts were rich in oil.So, the clever carpenter then on the basis of the northern stone tank oil mill, created the Hakka "plate grinding hammer hit" oil mill.

The oil mill consists of a water wheel, a rolling plate, a large pressing tank and a hanging hammer, which is usually built on the banks of a stream with concentrated villages, abundant water and green trees.

Oil master commonly known as "playing oil guy", generally have 3-5 people, both to have skilled technology, but also have a strong physical strength.Every year at the beginning of winter this day is the "legal" oil pressing start day, the boss led the press and the presence of oil pressing customers, lit candles, lit red incense, reverently in front of the god of Zhao patriarch, three kneel nine knock, Zhi asked him to come down from the sky to "guide" the year of pressing.

2.production processes

The raw material for extracting oil is the kernel of camellia trees. Every winter, camellia seeds are collected from the mountain and sent to the local manual oil pressing house after drying, peeling and drying.

Then straw is added to make the oil cake, then fixed with iron hoops and put in the chamber of the oil press, and then stuffed into the wooden block on the side of the oil cake, and finally hit a triangular wedge between the hanging bump bars.Through the concerted control of the collision rod, with the increasing of this force, the wedge again and again, the wedge is gradually driven into the press. The wooden block in the press will produce the extrusion force on the oil cake, and the camellia oil will slowly overflow from the tea seeds, making the whole workshop full of the fragrance of camellia oil.Method Although old-fashioned, but ecological environmental protection, no industrial machines and industrial raw materials pollution, squeezed out of the original oil, mellow and clear.

As we can see in the old workshops, the oil pressing equipment is relatively simple and original ecology. The main part of the wood oil press is made of a whole large tree trunk. This big tree generally has to grow for hundreds of years.

This ancient method of oil extraction process is relatively cumbersome, the oil production rate is low, from tea picking fruit to oil filtration needs to go through more than ten processes, a long time span, most of the work has to rely on manpower to complete, the labor intensity is also very large.Nowadays, many workshops have been changed to machines to operate oil pressing, making it simpler and more efficient, and the traditional ancient oil pressing technique is also on the verge of being lost.