In the old agricultural society, from about the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, housewives would be busy preparing food for the New Year.

Because pickling cured meat takes a long time, it must be started as early as possible.

Many provinces in my country have the custom of pickling cured meats, among which the cured meats of Guangdong Province are the most famous.

There are many kinds of cured meats, including sausages, bacon, cured duck, cured fish, wind chicken, wind liver, etc. Even if you don’t have cured meat at home, you must buy one or two to satisfy your craving.

Jing bacon can be eaten steamed and sliced, or mixed with garlic sprouts, chili peppers, or stir-fried vegetables.

During the busy New Year festival, cured meat is the simplest and most delicious New Year dish.

The cured meat has just been marinated. Next, it’s time to steam the rice cakes.

Because rice cakes are homophonic to "year high" and come in a variety of flavors, they have become a must-have seasonal food for almost every household.

The styles of rice cakes include square-shaped yellow and white rice cakes, which symbolize gold and silver; there are also strip-shaped Ningbo and Fuzhou rice cakes, which are shaped like silver bars; both use their shapes to express the meaning of getting rich in the new year.

In the past, making rice cakes was all done by hand. The day before, the glutinous rice had to be soaked overnight, and then ground into rice slurry with a stone mill. After putting it into a cloth bag, put a stone on the bag to weigh it down. After the water was drained, the rice was

Take out the dough, add ingredients, season, and then steam slowly over charcoal fire in a steamer.

If you want to steam rice cakes that are excellent, fragrant and full of flavor, you can’t be careless at all.

Skilled housewives can often rely on years of experience to get every step just right.

The taste of rice cakes varies from place to place.

Beijingers like to eat red date rice cake, mince rice cake and white rice cake made from glutinous rice or yellow rice.

People in Hebei like to add jujube, red beans, mung beans, etc. to rice cakes and steam them together.

In northern Shanxi and Inner Mongolia and other places, it is customary to eat fried rice cakes made with yellow rice flour during the Chinese New Year. Some of them are also filled with bean paste, jujube paste and other fillings.

Eastern steamed rice cakes mainly use sticky sorghum rice and some beans, while Shandong people use yellow rice and red dates to steam rice cakes.

Northern rice cakes are mainly sweet and can be steamed or fried. Some people even eat them dipped in sugar.

Southern rice cakes are both sweet and salty.

For example, the rice cakes in Suzhou and Ningbo are made from japonica rice and have a light taste.

In addition to steaming and frying, you can also stir-fry or make soup.

The sweet rice cake is made from glutinous rice flour, sugar, lard, roses, osmanthus, mint, vegetarian paste and other ingredients.

It can be steamed directly or dipped in egg white and fried.

Guangdong's radish cake and taro cake are made in a unique way; first chop the radish or taro, mix with sauteed bacon, dried shrimps, mushrooms and other ingredients, then add rice balls and steam them.

Water chestnut (water chestnut) cake is also a famous product in Guangdong. It is made by peeling the water chestnuts and grinding them into powder, then adding rice flour and sugar to steam it.

The traditional concept is that the success or failure of steamed rice cakes is related to the luck of the coming year, so there are some taboos when steaming rice cakes.

For example, you are not allowed to say unlucky words, you are not allowed to make loud noises, etc.

In many northern provinces, dumplings are made during the Chinese New Year.

Although dumplings have long been a daily snack popular all over the country.

But the dumplings eaten on New Year's Eve have a special meaning.

In the old days, time was measured based on the heavenly stems and earthly branches. The time of birth was right after Hai hour on New Year's Eve, which was the latest moment of the New Year. It is said that eating dumplings at this time means "a good start and everything goes well."

And because this is the time of Jiaozi (time), eating dumplings is homophonic to "Jiaozi (time)".

In addition, because dumplings resemble ingots in shape, eating dumplings during the Chinese New Year has an auspicious meaning of "bringing in wealth and treasure".

Dumplings are made of flour and have a variety of fillings.

The traditional method is to use pig, beef, and mutton as stuffing, paired with vegetables such as Chinese cabbage, celery, leeks, radishes, and melons.

With the new method, any delicacies can be used as fillings, such as chicken, duck, carp, crab roe, crab meat, squid, abalone, shrimp, sea cucumber, shark's fin, fish maw, scallops, Hericium, etc.

The most "orthodox" way to eat dumplings is to boil them in water, scoop them out and eat them with soy sauce mixed with vinegar, minced garlic and sesame oil.

There are also ways to eat "fried dumplings" and "pan-fried dumplings (pot stickers)".

In some areas of Henan and Shaanxi, dumplings are cooked and eaten together with noodles, which is called "Golden Thread Wearing Yuanbao".

In Inner Mongolia and Northeast China, some people cook dumplings in white meat and pickled cabbage hot pot, which gives them a unique flavor.

In addition to the above-mentioned common New Year's Eve foods, every housewife also has to go to great lengths to cook a New Year's Eve dinner that is full of color, aroma and taste.

In addition to being exquisite and rich in New Year dishes, good taste is also a must.

For example, the New Year's dinner of Beijing people is made of yellow and white rice, called "gold and silver rice", with pine and cypress branches inserted on it and decorated with money, dates, chestnuts, longan, etc.

Jiangnan people use dried tomato stems and mixed fruits and vegetables to cook "comfort vegetables".

When eating New Year's Eve dinner, you must first take a bite of comfort food.

Fish is also an indispensable New Year dish because it sounds homophonic to "yu".

Even in the north, where there are no fish, a wood-carved fish is placed on the table to commemorate the occasion, to show "abundance every year."

Rice cakes, glutinous rice balls, dumplings, noodles, longevity fruits (also known as peanuts), and fish (symbolizing abundance every year).

Agree 1 | Comment on Laba Porridge "Laba Festival".

On this day, there is a custom among Chinese people to eat Laba porridge.

Eating Laba porridge has a history of thousands of years in our country.

La was originally the name of a kind of sacrifice in ancient times. It was called "Qingsi" in the Xia Dynasty, "Jiaping" in the Yin and Shang Dynasties, and was renamed "La" in the Zhou Dynasty.

"La" evolved from the word "Hunt", so "La" and "Hunt" are connected.

Because at the end of the first year, the crops have been harvested and dried, and there is a slack season, people go to the wild to hunt animals and use them to sacrifice their ancestors and worship the gods, pray for longevity, and avoid disasters and welcome good fortune. This is called "December Festival".