On the 23rd day of the lunar calendar, customs vary from place to place. There is a custom of eating jiaozi on the 23rd day of the northern lunar calendar. Shandong Luxi eats sticky cakes, Guangxi Wuxuan and Guiping make rice cakes, Nanning eats rice cakes, and southeastern Shanxi eats fried corn. Jiaozi ate it on the 23rd day of the northern lunar calendar. When serving, jiaozi should put it on the table. In addition, there is a folk saying that "jiaozi is better than delicious". During the Spring Festival, jiaozi is an indispensable food.
There is a folk song "Twenty-three, Sticking Cakes" in Luxi, Shandong Province. Every year, the 23rd day of the twelfth lunar month is the day when every family eats sticky cakes. It means to stick the mouth of the kitchen god and let him say that the weather is good and the world is not bad. Sticky cakes are made of yellow rice and red dates. They are sweet and swollen, and the entrance is soft, which means "high every year".
On the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month, people in Wuxuan, Guiping and other places in Guangxi have the custom of making rice cakes. The rice cake is made of glutinous rice flour as the main material, peanuts, sesame seeds and sugar as ingredients, and put into a mold to make it round. Then steamed at high temperature, with a unique taste and the meaning of "round".
Brief introduction of off-year
Off-year, a traditional festival in China, is also called Lunar New Year Festival, Kitchen God Festival and Kitchen God Festival. Folk activities in off-year mainly include sweeping dust and offering sacrifices to stoves. China has a vast territory and different customs. Due to different local customs, the days called "off-year" are different. The 24th of the twelfth lunar month is in most parts of the south, and the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month is in the north.
Off-year is usually considered as the beginning of a busy year, which means that people begin to prepare new year's goods, sweep dust and offer sacrifices to stoves. And prepare for a clean and beautiful year to express people's good wishes to bid farewell to the old and welcome the new. Sacrificial stoves have a history of several thousand years in China, which reflects the dream of China people to have enough food and clothing.