Reunion dinner is a banquet for family reunion, which means good luck, wealth, perfection and reunion.
The ingredients and dishes of the reunion dinner mostly have auspicious meanings, such as Nostoc and oysters in Guangdong, which are homophones for "facai" and "good market". People in the Jianghuai area often eat yuanzi (raw materials) that symbolize perfection and reunion. There are many ways to make it), and northerners eat dumplings that symbolize ingots. In Japan, buckwheat noodles called Nenkotsu Soba are eaten as a symbol of longevity.
The annual "Reunion Dinner" is extremely important to the Chinese people. The reunion of family members can give people spiritual comfort and satisfaction. The whole family respects and loves each other, and talks about family relationships. Sitting around the dinner table is a blissful time.
Southern Customs of Reunion Dinner:
About ten days before the festival, people start busy purchasing new year’s goods, including chicken, duck, fish, tea, wine, oil and sauce, roasted seeds and nuts from the north and south, and candies and fruits. Buy enough. Before the New Year, New Year rice should be prepared in advance and placed in a bamboo basket, with red orange, black water chestnut, water chestnut and other fruits and ingot cake on top, and pine and cypress branches should be inserted.
Every New Year’s meal should be in auspicious terms. People in Jiangnan make tea during the New Year to honor guests, and put two olives on the tea tray or on the lid of the bowl, which is called "Wubao tea". During the New Year’s meal, there must be stir-fried vegetables, which is said to be “hot and affectionate”; bean sprouts must be eaten, because the shape of soybean sprouts resembles “ruyi”; fish heads must be eaten with every meal, but cannot be eaten all, which is called “there will be fish (surplus) every year” ".