People in Tianjin cook Laba porridge, which is similar to that in Beijing, with lotus seeds, lilies, pearl rice, Yirenmi, barley kernels, sticky glutinous rice, sticky yellow rice, beans, mung beans, longan pulp, longan pulp, ginkgo, red dates and sweet-scented osmanthus in syrup, etc., which are all good in color, fragrance and taste. In recent years, black rice has been added. This Laba porridge can be used for dietotherapy, and has the effects of invigorating spleen, stimulating appetite, invigorating qi, calming the nerves, clearing away heart fire and nourishing blood.
Laba porridge in Shanxi, also known as Babao porridge, is mainly made of millet, with cowpea, adzuki bean, mung bean and jujube as well as sticky yellow rice, rice and glutinous rice. In southeastern Shanxi, it is also one of the food customs to cook porridge with water, which is called sweet rice, that is, adzuki beans, red beans, cowpeas, sweet potatoes, peanuts, glutinous rice and persimmon on the fifth day of the twelfth lunar month.
On the day of Laba in the northern Shaanxi Plateau, porridge is cooked with a variety of dried fruits, tofu and meat in addition to rice and beans. Usually cooked in the morning, sweet or salty, depending on people's taste. If it's lunch, we should cook some noodles in the porridge and have a family reunion dinner. After eating, you should also put porridge on the door, the stove and the trees outside the door to ward off evil spirits and avoid disasters and welcome the bumper agricultural harvest in the coming year. According to folk legend, Laba is forbidden to eat vegetables on this day, saying that there are many weeds in the field after eating Lai crops. Laba people in southern Shaanxi want to eat mixed porridge, which is divided into "five flavors" and "eight flavors". The former is cooked with rice, glutinous rice, peanuts, ginkgo and beans. The latter uses the above five raw materials to increase diced meat, tofu and radish, and also adds seasonings. On Laba Day, people not only eat Laba porridge, but also worship ancestors and granaries with porridge.
Gansu people traditionally cook Laba porridge with grains and vegetables, which are not only eaten by family members, but also distributed to neighbors and fed to livestock. In the urban areas of Lanzhou and Baiyin, Laba porridge is cooked with rice, beans, red dates, ginkgo, lotus seeds, raisins, dried apricots, dried melons, walnuts, shredded green beans, sugar and diced meat. After cooking, it is first used to worship the door god, kitchen god, earth god and god of wealth, and pray for good weather and good harvests in the coming year; Then give it to the neighbors and enjoy it for the last family. Wuwei, Gansu pays attention to "Su Laba", eating rice thick rice, lentil rice or thick rice, and eating it with fried seeds and twist after cooking. Folklore calls it "bean porridge soaked".
People in Ningxia usually cook porridge with lentils, soybeans, red beans, broad beans, black beans, rice and potatoes, and add "wheat ears" cut into rhombic willow leaves with wheat flour or buckwheat flour, or "sparrow heads" made into small round eggs, and then add chopped green onion oil before cooking. On this day, the whole family only ate laba rice, not vegetables.
Although most Xining people in Qinghai are Han people, Laba does not eat porridge, but eats wheat kernel rice. Boil the freshly ground wheat kernels with beef and mutton, add green salt, ginger skin, pepper, tsaoko, Miao Xiang and other condiments, and after a night of slow fire, the meat and wheat blend into a milky shape. When the pot is uncovered in the morning, it smells delicious.
In the "Confucius Food System" in Shandong Province, it is stipulated that there are two kinds of "Laba porridge". One kind is cooked with rice kernels, longan, lotus seeds, lilies, chestnuts, red dates and japonica rice, and some "porridge fruits" are added to the bowl, mainly carved into fruits of various shapes for ornament. This kind of porridge is specially for the master of Confucius and the master of the Twelve Houses. The other is cooked with rice, sliced meat, cabbage, tofu, etc., which is for the servants in Confucius' house to drink.
People in Henan eat laba rice, which is cooked with eight kinds of raw materials, such as millet, mung bean, cowpea, wheat kernel, peanut, red date and corn. When cooked, add some brown sugar and walnut kernel to make the porridge thick and fragrant, which means a bumper harvest in the coming year.
there are two kinds of laba porridge in Jiangsu, sweet and salty, and the cooking method is the same. It's just that salty porridge is served with vegetables and oil. Suzhou people should add arrowheads, water chestnuts, walnuts, pine nuts, Gordon Euryale seeds, red dates, chestnuts, fungus, vegetables, Flammulina velutipes and so on when cooking Laba porridge. Li Fu, a scholar in Suzhou in the Qing Dynasty, once wrote a poem: "The porridge on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month was spread from the kingdom of Brahma, and the seven treasures were beautifully blended and the five flavors were mixed."
Zhejiang people usually cook Laba porridge with walnut kernel, pine nuts, Gordon Euryale seeds, lotus seeds, red dates, longan meat, lychee meat, etc., which is sweet and delicious, and they pray for a long life. It is said that this porridge cooking method was spread from Nanjing, which contains some legends.
There are many people in Sichuan. Laba porridge is made in a variety of ways, sweet, salty and spicy, while rural people eat more salty porridge, which is mainly made of soybeans, peanuts, diced meat, white radish and carrots. Strangers come here to taste, although do as the Romans do, but it is difficult to get used to it. Nowadays, there are many people in cities who eat sweet porridge, which can be called different flavors. Laba is closely related to porridge, and porridge is drunk in Laba, which can be regarded as a fancy and a level.
Chinese people love Laba porridge so much, and there are some scientific reasons besides eating customs. "Porridge Spectrum" written by Cao Yanshan, a nutritionist in the Qing Dynasty, gives a detailed and clear account of the fitness and nutritional functions of Laba porridge, which is a good food therapy with the functions of regulating stomach, invigorating spleen, nourishing heart, clearing away lung heat, benefiting kidney, benefiting liver, quenching thirst, improving eyesight, relaxing bowels and calming the nerves. These have been confirmed by modern medicine. For the elderly, Laba porridge is also a good food, but we should also pay attention to not drinking too much. In fact, it is not only Laba, but also porridge for the elderly. There are quite a few varieties of porridge, which can vary from person to person, so you can choose according to your needs and eat as appropriate. (Fujian Hotline)
Laba Tofu
"Laba Tofu" is a folk specialty in Qian County, Anhui Province. On Laba on the eve of the Spring Festival, that is, around the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, every household in Qian County will sun-dry tofu, which is called "Laba Tofu" by the people.
Emerald Jasper Laba Garlic
Pickling Laba Garlic is a custom in North China, especially in North China. As the name implies, garlic is brewed on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month. In fact, the materials are very simple, namely vinegar and garlic cloves. The method is also extremely simple. Put the peeled garlic cloves in a container that can be sealed, such as a jar or a bottle, then pour in vinegar, seal the mouth and put it in a cold place. Slowly, garlic soaked in vinegar will turn green, and finally it will become green all over, like jade and jasper.
Boil Five Beans
In some places, Laba porridge is cooked, which is not called Laba porridge, but called boiled Five Beans. Some are cooked on Laba day, while others are cooked on the fifth day of the twelfth lunar month, and some "sparrow heads" are kneaded with flour and cooked with rice and beans (five kinds of beans). It is said that people in Laba eat "sparrow's head" and sparrows have a headache, which will not harm crops in the coming year. This kind of "five beans" cooked is not only for food, but also for relatives and neighbors. Every day, when eating, it is heated and eaten together, and it is eaten until the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month, symbolizing more than one year.
laba noodles
in some places in northern China where rice is not produced or less, people eat laba noodles instead of laba porridge. The next day, the whole family will eat Laba noodles on the morning of the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month.
The most important festival in the twelfth lunar month is the eighth day of December, which was called "La Ri" in ancient times and commonly known as "Laba Festival". Since the pre-Qin period, Laba Festival has been used to worship ancestors and gods and pray for good harvest and good luck. It is said that Sakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism, also achieved enlightenment on the eighth day of December, so Laba is also a festival for Buddhists, which is called "Buddhist Enlightenment Festival".
Laba has the custom of eating Laba porridge, which is also called "Qibao Wuwei porridge". China has a history of drinking Laba porridge for more than 1 years. It first began in the Song Dynasty. On the day of Laba, whether it's the imperial court, the government, the temple or the people's house of Limin, Laba porridge will be cooked. In the Qing Dynasty, the custom of drinking Laba porridge was even more popular. At court, emperors, queens and princes all give laba porridge to ministers of civil and military affairs and attendants, and distribute rice and fruits to monasteries for monks to eat. In the folk, every household should also make Laba porridge to worship their ancestors; At the same time, family groups get together to eat and give gifts to relatives and friends.
there are many varieties of laba porridge in China. Among them, Beiping is the most exquisite, and there are many items mixed in white rice, such as red dates, lotus seeds, walnuts, chestnuts, almonds, pine nuts, longan, hazelnuts, grapes, ginkgo, water chestnut, moss, roses, red beans, peanuts, etc., totaling no less than twenty kinds. On the night of the seventh day of the twelfth lunar month, people began to get busy, washing rice, soaking fruits, peeling, removing stones, picking carefully, then starting to cook in the middle of the night, and then stewing with low fire until the next morning, when Laba porridge was cooked.
For a more exquisite family, the fruit should be carved into human shapes, animals and patterns first, and then boiled in a pot. More distinctive is to put "fruit lion" in Laba porridge. Fruit lion is a lion made of several kinds of fruits, with crisp dates peeled and dried as the lion's body, half walnut kernel as the lion's head, peach kernel as the lion's foot and sweet almond as the lion's tail. Then stick them together with sugar and put them in a porridge bowl, just like a little lion. If the bowl is bigger, you can put two lions or four little lions. More exquisite, it is to use jujube paste, bean paste, yam, hawthorn cake and other foods with various colors to knead them into statues of the Eight Immortals, longevity stars and arhats. This kind of decorative Laba porridge can only be seen on the altar of the former big temple.
after laba porridge is cooked, you should worship god and worship your ancestors first. After that, you should give it to your relatives and friends, and you must send it out before noon. Finally, it is eaten by the whole family. The leftover Laba porridge, which is preserved after eating for a few days, is a good sign, which means that it is more than enough every year. If you give porridge to poor people to eat, it is even more good for yourself.
Laba porridge also has the function of witchcraft among the people. If there are flowers and fruit trees in the yard, we should also smear some Laba porridge on the branches. I believe it will bear more fruits in the coming year.
On the day of Laba, in addition to offering sacrifices to ancestors and worshipping God, there are also people who mourn the national subjugation and place their grief.
December 8th of the lunar calendar is the Laba Festival in China. In rural areas of China, many farmers still keep the custom of drinking Laba porridge on this day. (The twelfth lunar month is also called the twelfth lunar month: because it was freezing and snowy at that time, farmers could not go out to farm, so they could only cook bacon, sausages and other foods at home).
It turns out that "Laba porridge" is no ordinary porridge, and there is a story behind it ...
Once upon a time, there was such a family, an old couple and a young couple lived a happy life. The old couple loves the young couple very much and won't let them do any work because they are afraid that they will be tired. Therefore, the young couple can't do anything all day with their mouths open and their clothes stretched out.
Later, the old couple passed away. Because the young couple couldn't work, they ate up all the food at home and finally sold their house, leaving only half a rotten hut. Winter came, and the young couple were frozen and hungry, hiding in the hut and shivering. On the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, they were so hungry that they swept out a little miscellaneous grains from the corner of the hut and cooked a little porridge to satisfy their hunger. When they cooked porridge and were about to eat it, suddenly a strong wind blew down the hut and the young couple were crushed to death.
People know this. In order to remind children of this lesson, on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, they cook a pot of porridge with all kinds of miscellaneous grains and tell this story while eating.