Lotus seeds, barley, red dates, longan, millet, glutinous rice, peanuts, adzuki beans

December 8 of the lunar calendar is the Chinese Laba Festival, and people have the habit of eating Laba porridge. Laba porridge is also called eight-treasure porridge. According to legend, the Laba Festival is the day when Buddha "enlightened". Buddhist temples follow the story of the shepherd girl offering rice to the Buddha and make porridge from eight kinds of fragrant grains and fruits for the Buddha. Hence the name eight-treasure porridge. The preparation method of Laba porridge is simple and rich in nutrients. The taste is sweet. In the Song Dynasty, people rushed to imitate it and spread it widely, becoming a delicacy deeply loved by the people.

The eighth day of the twelfth lunar month is regarded by the Buddhist community as the day when the Buddha became enlightened. Monks and nuns in the temple often cook "Eight Treasures Porridge" with eight kinds of food, including glutinous rice, sesame seeds, Yiren, Guiyuan, red dates, shiitake mushrooms, and lotus seeds, and invite the surrounding people to eat it. The people take the Holy Communion and give alms to the old and young of the people to show their respect for the Buddha. Later, people gradually cooked eight-treasure porridge (called Laba porridge) for consumption. The custom of eating "Laba porridge" was formed.

Every December 8th of the lunar calendar, ancient temples would cook porridge with fragrant grains and fruits to worship the Buddha. Folks also followed suit and cooked porridge on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month to ward off disasters and diseases. The folk Laba porridge in Hangzhou during the Song Dynasty was cooked with "walnuts, pine nuts, milk mushrooms, persimmons, chestnuts, etc." and rice. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, eating Laba porridge was popular in various places.

Laba porridge nominally requires eight ingredients, but it is not rigid. It can be as little as four or five, or as much as more than a dozen. The Laba porridge in some places is made of glutinous rice, brown sugar, 18 kinds of dried fruits and beans, and is very grand. Mix lotus seeds, ginkgo, peanuts, red dates, pine nuts with ginger and cinnamon and other seasonings into rice and cook it into Laba porridge, which can warm the hands and feet and nourish the body. There are also Laba porridge made from cowpeas, golden needles, fungus, tofu, mushrooms, etc. These are "thin Laba". The Laba porridge that ordinary people eat is made by adding vegetables, soybeans, broad beans, tofu, carrots, and water chestnuts to the rice. It is the so-called "thick Laba porridge". In some places in northern my country that do not produce or produce little rice, people do not eat Laba porridge, but eat Laba noodles. The next day, make sautee with various fruits and vegetables, roll out the noodles, and on the morning of the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, the whole family will eat Laba noodles. In some mountainous areas where corn is grown, during Laba season, corn is used instead of rice to make "Laba wheat kernels" to eat. Farmer custom is to make a meal of Laba porridge every time Laba day comes. To make Laba porridge, you can put an appropriate amount of whatever is delicious and edible in the pot, such as soybeans, mung beans, cowpeas, peas, ground eggs, potatoes, carrots, wheat flour, corn flour, sorghum flour, and large potatoes. Wheat flour, etc., are mixed into a pot of porridge. It is often said that if you eat well, you will grow well.

The twelfth lunar month is the end of the year. You must eat all kinds of grains and vegetables throughout the year, so that you can have comprehensive nutrition. This means praying for good health and prosperity for the family! The second thing is to eat everything and harvest everything. After the twelfth lunar month, it’s the new year. When eating Laba porridge, you eat all the grains and vegetables that grew in the fields that year. You don’t dislike anything, which shows that the farmers are committed to the new year. Everything harvested from the land is cherished. I hope that in the new year, all crops will grow well and be abundant.