Soy sauce was invented by the Chinese over 2,000 years ago and is still used in Chinese cooking every day. Nowadays people don't give much thought to the traditional way of making soy sauce, as they mostly buy the soy sauce produced in modern chemical methods.
Little known to the outside world, a century-old factory in Xianshi town, Luzhou city, Sichuan, still uses the natural method to produce soy sauce. It simply puts the soybean mixture in big jars under the sun. It takes up to three years to complete. Since 1893, the company has been making soy sauce for more than 130 years.
Water, salt and soybeans are needed to make soy sauce. Natural bacteria(菌群) and old jars make it taste better. The process (工序) allows the beans to naturally produce oil, making a full taste. It is the most special thing of this soy sauce. The factory can only produce about 2,000 jars of soy sauce every year. Also, it takes over ten times longer to finish the whole process in this traditional way. As a result, the factory has faced many ups and downs.
Luckily, the traditional method of making soy sauce in this factory became an intangible cultural heritage (非物质文化遗产) in Sichuan province in 2007, and was an intangible cultural heritage of China in 2014. "I had the idea to give it up, but I usually said to myself that good things never come easy, just like our soy sauce." the factory owner said.