Eating glutinous rice balls is a traditional custom of China people, especially in the south of the Yangtze River. There is a folk saying that "eating glutinous rice balls is one year older". Chen Zhisui's "Tangyuan" poem says: "Every winter solstice, everyone cooks, and at the age of one, do you know?" There is a saying in Ningbo: "Every family in Ningbo makes glutinous rice balls, and contentment is always another day."
"Ningbo Tangyuan" is a necessary food and a round dessert made of glutinous rice flour. "Round" means "reunion" and "perfection". Eating Tangyuan during festivals symbolizes family harmony and auspiciousness, so it is also called "Floating Yuanzi".
Tangyuan originated in the Song Dynasty in China. At that time, Mingzhou (now Ningbo City, Zhejiang Province) began to eat a novel food, that is, black sesame, lard and white sugar were used as raw materials. First, black sesame was ground into powder, and then lard and white sugar were put into the mixture one after another to knead into a ball to make stuffing, and glutinous rice flour was used to knead it into a circle. After cooking, it tasted sweet and delicious. Because this kind of glutinous rice balls boiled in a pot floats and sinks, it was originally called "Floating Yuanzi", and later it was renamed as Tangyuan.