Tangyuan is a southern food and Lantern Festival is a northern food. They look similar, but the cooking and eating methods are different. There are many ancient poems with the meaning of Yuanxiao, but fewer with the meaning of Tangyuan.

Tang Yuan

Chen Zhisui

The round longans are all round, and it takes a lot of effort to eat them.

Slowly scoop out the water from the silver vat while mixing the clouds, and gently massage the skin of the jade palm with the snow.

Push the white duck into the soup pot and roll the yellow beads in the sugar bowl.

Every winter solstice, every family cooks, knowing that there is no one-year-old Qiantian.

Shangyuan Zhuzhi Ci

Qing Dynasty: Fu Zeng

Walnuts are wrapped in sweet-scented osmanthus stuffing, and glutinous rice is like pearls washed from wells.

I heard that Majia’s dripping powder is good, and they sell Yuanxiao in the lantern style.

What night is this night? We are reunited and we are doing everything together. The official of Tang Dynasty inspected the old food, and the servant girl of the kitchen was surprised by the new work. The stars are shining in the dark clouds, and the beads are floating in the turbid water. When I was young, I compiled miscellaneous chants and added them to describe family traditions. ——Zhou Bida's "Yuanxiao Boiled Floating Rice Balls"