On the winter solstice, the sun's direct position on the ground reaches the southernmost point of the year, almost directly at the Tropic of Capricorn (23°26' south latitude). The Northern Hemisphere gets the least amount of sunlight on this day, 50% less than the Southern Hemisphere. Daylight in the Northern Hemisphere is at its shortest, and gets shorter the farther north you go.
It is a custom in China to eat dumplings on the winter solstice. As the saying goes, "When the winter solstice arrives, eat dumplings." Of course, there are exceptions, such as in Tengzhou, Shandong Province, the popular winter solstice day to drink mutton soup custom, meaning to drive away the cold meaning. Food customs vary from place to place, but eating dumplings is the most common. In today's Jiangnan area still have: eat the winter solstice night rice long a year of saying, commonly known as "add years".
Winter solstice from
In China's ancient times on the winter solstice is very important, the winter solstice is treated as a larger festival solstice, there was a "winter solstice is as big as the year," said, and there are customs to celebrate the winter solstice. The book of han said: "winter solstice yang qi up, jun dao long, so congratulations." People think: after the winter solstice, the day is longer than one day, Yang Qi rise, is the beginning of a cycle of festivals, is also an auspicious day, should be celebrated. The Book of Jin" on the record "Wei Jin winter solstice day by all the countries and bureaucrats to congratulate ...... its instrument is inferior to the first day of the year", indicating that the ancient importance of the winter solstice.
Now, some places still take the winter solstice as a festival to pass. Northern regions have the custom of slaughtering sheep, eating dumplings and wontons on the winter solstice, while southern regions have the habit of eating winter solstice rice balls and winter solstice long thread noodles on this day. Various regions also have the custom of offering sacrifices to the sky and ancestors on the day of the winter solstice.
The winter solstice festival originated in the Han Dynasty, flourished in the Tang and Song dynasties, and continues to this day. Qing Jiaru" even has "winter solstice is as big as the year" said. This shows that the ancients attached great importance to the winter solstice. People believe that the winter solstice is the natural transformation of yin and yang, is a blessing from heaven. The Han Dynasty to the winter solstice for the "Winter Festival", the government should be held to congratulate the ceremony known as "congratulations on the winter", routine vacation. The Book of the Later Han Dynasty has this record: "Before and after the winter solstice, the gentleman is in peace and quiet, all the officials are not listening to the government, choose the auspicious moment and then save the matter." So this day the court up and down to take a holiday, the army on standby, the border closed, business, friends and family with food gifts, visit each other, happy to have a "quiet body" holiday.
Tang, Song period, the winter solstice is the day of sacrifice to the ancestors, the emperor on this day to the outskirts of the ceremony held in heaven, the people on this day to the parents of the elders of worship, and now there are still some places in the winter solstice this day to celebrate the festival. Ancient people believed that the winter solstice is the day when yin and yang turn into a center, and after this day, the yin gas gradually disappears and the yang gas gradually grows. On the winter solstice, the emperor went to the Temple of Heaven to offer sacrifices to the heavens, and the next day he received congratulations from civil and military officials in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.
One of the Winter Solstice Legends
There used to be a saying in old Beijing that "Winter Solstice Wonton and Summer Solstice Noodles". According to legend, during the Han Dynasty, the Huns in the north often harassed the border at the winter solstice, and the people had no peace. At that time, there were two leaders of the Hun tribe, the Huns and the Tuns, who were very cruel. The people hated them so much that they wrapped them in meat and took the sound of "Hun" and "Tun" and called them "Hundun". Hate to eat, and seek to quell the war, can live in peace. Because the first made of wontons is in the winter solstice this day, in the winter solstice this day every family to eat wontons.
Eating "pinch frozen ears" is the winter solstice in Henan people eat dumplings commonly known. The reason for this custom? According to legend, Nanyang medical saint Zhang Zhongjing had been an official in Changsha, he returned home when he sued for his old age in the snowy winter, the cold winds piercing the bones. He saw the villagers on both sides of the White River in Nanyang, not covered, many people's ears were frozen, heart very sad, asked his disciples in Nanyang Guandong set up a medical hut, with mutton, chili peppers and some cold-expelling medicinal herbs placed in a pot to cook, fish out and chopped up, wrapped in dough to look like an ear, and then put down in the pot to cook, and made a kind of medicine called "cold-expelling ear-correcting soup" alms to the people to eat. After serving, the folks' ears were cured. Later, every winter solstice, people imitated to do to eat, so the formation of "pinch frozen ears" this custom. Later, people called it dumplings, and some called it "flat food" and "hot noodle dumplings", and people have also been said to have eaten the winter solstice dumplings do not freeze.
Winter Solstice Legend No. 2
The custom of eating dog meat on the winter solstice is said to have begun in the Han Dynasty. According to legend, Liu Bang, the founder of the Han Dynasty, ate dog meat cooked by Fan Kuai on the winter solstice, and found the flavor particularly delicious and praised it. Since then, the custom of eating dog meat on the winter solstice has been formed in folklore. Nowadays, people have to eat dog meat, mutton and all kinds of nourishing food on the winter solstice, in order to have a good omen in the coming year.
Winter Solstice Legends of the third
In the Jiangnan water towns, there is the winter solstice night the whole family gathered **** eat red beans and glutinous rice custom. According to legend, there is a man called **** Gong's, his son is not talented, evil, died on the day of the winter solstice, after death into an epidemic ghost, continue to brutalize the people. However, this epidemic ghost is most afraid of adzuki beans, so people cook and eat adzuki beans rice on the day of the winter solstice to drive away the epidemic ghosts, disaster prevention and elimination of disease.
Dietary Culture
The winter solstice is a rich festival, according to legend, the winter solstice in the history of the Zhou Dynasty is the New Year's Day, once a very lively day. In today's Jiangnan area still have: ate the winter solstice night rice long a year old saying, commonly known as "add years". Northern regions have the winter solstice slaughter sheep, eat dumplings, eat wontons custom, the southern region in this day have eaten the winter solstice rice ball, winter solstice long noodle habit. Various regions also have the custom of offering sacrifices to the sky and ancestors on this day of the winter solstice.
The winter solstice has developed over thousands of years, forming a unique seasonal food culture. Such as wontons, dumplings, dumplings, red bean congee, corn cake, etc. can be used as the New Year's food. There were more fashionable "winter solstice feast" also has a lot of names, such as eating winter solstice meat, offer winter solstice plate, for winter solstice group, wonton winter worship.
Eating Dumplings
Winter solstice to, dumplings are pretty. Every winter solstice to eat dumplings
Winter solstice to eat dumplings
Year lunar winter solstice this day, rich or poor, dumplings is essential to the holiday meal, the major supermarkets and shopping malls, such as dumplings are sold very "pretty". Proverb: "October 1, the winter solstice to, families eat dumplings." Why do we eat dumplings on the winter solstice? Why do we eat dumplings on the winter solstice? It is said that this custom is to commemorate the "medical saint" Zhang Zhongjing winter solstice medicine left.
Zhang Zhongjing was a Nanyang Wudong people, he wrote "Typhoid Miscellaneous Diseases", the collection of medical practitioners of the great, by successive generations of medical practitioners as a classic. Zhang Zhongjing famously said, "Advance to save the world, retreat to save the people; can not be a good prime minister, but also should be a good doctor." During the Eastern Han Dynasty, he was the governor of Changsha, visiting the sick and practicing medicine in the lobby. Later, he resigned and returned to his hometown to cure his neighbors. When he returned to his hometown, it was winter. He saw the villagers on both sides of the Baihe River were yellow and thin, starving and cold, and many people's ears were frozen. Then let his disciples in Nanyang Dongguan set up a medical shed, set up a cauldron, in the winter solstice day she "dispel cold Jiao ear soup" to cure frostbite. He put lamb, chili peppers and some cold-expelling herbs in a pot of boiling, and then the lamb, drugs out of the chopped, breaded into an ear-like "Jiao Er", cooked, distributed to the people who came to seek medication for each of the two "Jiao Er", a big bowl of broth. People ate "Jiao Er", drank "cold soup", warm body, two ears heat, frostbitten ears are cured. Later generations followed the example of "Jiao Er" and wrapped it into food, also known as "dumplings" or "flat food".
Eating dumplings
Ancient poems say: "Every family pounded rice to make dumplings, eat dumplings at the winter solstice
Eating dumplings at the winter solstice
Knowing that it's the winter solstice day of the Ming Dynasty." Eating dumplings on the winter solstice is a traditional custom in China, especially prevalent in the south of the Yangtze River, the folk have "eaten dumplings a year older," said. Soup dumplings, also known as soup dumplings, eat soup dumplings on the winter solstice is also called "winter solstice group"; soup dumplings can be used for ancestor worship, can also be used to give each other friends and relatives. In the old days, Shanghainese people paid the most attention to eating soup dumplings, and they tasted newly brewed sweet white wine, flower cakes and glutinous rice flour dumplings at family banquets, and then sacrificed to their ancestors with pieces of meat on a plate.
Eating wontons
Many places in China have the custom of eating wontons on the winter solstice. Eating wontons on winter solstice
Eating wontons on winter solstice
According to the "Record of the Years and Seasons of Yanjing", "Winter solstice wontons and summer solstice noodles." On the winter solstice, people in the capital mostly eat wontons. In the Southern Song Dynasty, Lin'an (present-day Hangzhou) also had the custom of eating wontons on the day of the winter solstice. Zhou Mi, a Song dynasty person, said that people in Lin'an ate wontons on the winter solstice to honor their ancestors. It was only in the Southern Song Dynasty that the custom of eating wontons on the winter solstice to honor ancestors began to prevail in China.
Eat red beans and glutinous rice
In the Jiangnan water towns, there is the winter solstice night the whole family gathered *** eat red beans and glutinous rice custom. According to legend, there is a man called **** Gong's, his son is not talented, evil, died on the day of the winter solstice, after death into an epidemic ghost, continue to brutalize the people. However, this epidemic ghost is most afraid of adzuki beans, so people cook and eat adzuki beans rice on the winter solstice this day, to drive away the epidemic ghosts, disaster prevention and elimination of disease.
Eat buckwheat noodles
Zhejiang and other places every winter solstice this day, the whole family men, women and children to set, married out of the daughter to rush back to her in-laws.
Households should make buckwheat noodles to eat. Customs believe that eating buckwheat on the winter solstice can remove pig hair and chicken feathers from the intestines.
Eat vegetable buns
The vegetable buns are made of glutinous rice ground into powder and cooked and rotten sagebrush Penny and other things, kneaded into a perch, made into a half-moon shape, breaded bread bamboo shoots, dried beans, preserved vegetables, etc., is since ancient times the sacrifice of the winter offering, the ancients are called the ring cake (Jin Dynasty, when called the cold utensils). Early in the morning of the winter solstice, housewives had to get up early to "float rounds" (boiled in sugar water), "cook vegetable buns" (steamed vegetable buns) and prepare to worship the gods and ancestors, and to enjoy the "winter solstice rounds", eat "winter solstice rounds".
Eating dog meat
The custom of eating dog meat on the winter solstice is said to have begun in the Han Dynasty. According to legend, Liu Bang, the first Han emperor, ate dog meat cooked by Fan Kuai on the winter solstice and found the flavor particularly delicious and praised it. Since then, the custom of eating dog meat on winter solstice has been formed among the people. Folk also have "winter solstice to eat dog meat, tomorrow spring to fight the tiger" said. Now people in Guizhou and other areas have in the winter solstice this day, eat dog meat, mutton and a variety of tonic food, in order to have a good omen in the coming year.
Eating rice cakes
From the late Qing Dynasty until now Hangzhou people in the winter solstice are happy to eat rice cakes. In every winter solstice to do three meals of different flavors of rice cakes, eaten in the morning is sesame powder mixed with sugar rice cakes, at noon is the oil dun children's vegetables, asparagus, shredded pork fried rice cakes, dinner is potherb, shredded pork, shredded bamboo shoots soup rice cakes. Winter solstice to eat rice cakes, grow taller every year, figure a lucky. There are many places in the north, in the winter solstice this day have to eat dog meat and mutton custom, because after the winter solstice weather into the coldest period, Chinese medicine believes that mutton and dog meat have yang tonic body has the effect of folk so far there is winter solstice have to supplement the custom.