What are the must-eat foods during the Beginning of Summer? How many kinds of traditional delicacies have you eaten during the Beginning of Summer?

1. Beginning of Summer Rice

Every day before the Beginning of Summer, children will A neighbor's family asked for a bowl of rice, which they called "Douxiaxiami". Dig some bamboo shoots, "steal" some broad beans, and use some garlic sprouts. In the beginning of summer, cook the rice and ingredients in the open air. Put green plums, cherries, etc. on the rice and distribute it to the people who gave the rice a few days ago. The first family will have a small bowl. . It is believed that children can prevent heatstroke after eating it.

The Beginning of Summer rice is filled with condiments such as bamboo shoots, peas, broad beans, and amaranth, which means "abundant grains." Eating five-color rice at the Beginning of Summer also symbolizes good health all year round.

2. Beginning of Summer Eggs

Customs of the Han people south of the Yangtze River. Every time during the Beginning of Summer, people eat boiled eggs or salted duck eggs, believing that eating eggs in the Beginning of Summer can strengthen the body. Beginning of Summer eggs are the most classic food on Beginning of Summer. The day before the Beginning of Summer, the family begins to cook Beginning of Summer eggs. They are usually boiled with powdered tea leaves or walnut shells. Watching the eggshells slowly turn red, the house is filled with a fragrant aroma. Tea eggs should be eaten while they are hot. When eating, pour good Shaoxing wine and sprinkle some fine salt inside. The wine is fragrant and the tea is fragrant, fragrant and delicious.

Besides eating eggs, there are other ways to play. From the boiled eggs, pick out the whole ones that are not broken, weave them into egg covers with colorful threads, and hang them on the children's chest or on the tent. The children also have to hold the Beginning of Summer eggs (that is, touch the eggs), which is the happiest and most exciting thing of the day. When holding eggs, the egg shell is strong and does not break.

3. Beginning of Summer Porridge

Beginning of Summer Porridge is a traditional snack in Leiyang, Hunan Province and belongs to the Beginning of Summer Festival food. This snack is a must-have in Leiyang’s diet. Leiyang people have always attached great importance to farming and mulberry activities, and are particularly sensitive to the twenty-four solar terms. When every solar term is approaching, people always like to offer some festival foods in the form of sacrifices to intuitively and vividly remind each other not to forget about farming, not to miss the farming season, and to enjoy the joy of life through delicious food. For example, the Beginning of Summer is the time for rice transplanting. Farming is hard, so every household cooks Beginning of Summer porridge to express their best wishes for a good harvest. Beginning of Summer porridge is made with rice as the main ingredient, accompanied by more than a dozen condiments such as refined meat, glutinous rice balls, vermicelli, dried bamboo shoots, Chinese toon, pork offal, red dates, peas, bean sprouts, and eggs. After the pot is heated, it is steaming and the aroma is overflowing. Neighbors give each other gifts to show off their craftsmanship and to build rapport. Unfortunately, Beginning of Summer porridge can only be eaten during the Beginning of Summer. If people in Leiyang can carry forward this delicacy, make it in every solar term, and even make it a common delicacy in hotels, it will definitely be very popular.

4. Black rice

Black rice was originally a Chinese folk festival food and was available in the Tang Dynasty. In areas of Jiangsu and Anhui, on the eighth day of the fourth lunar month, many families use black rice leaves to cook black rice, which has become a custom.

The eighth day of the fourth lunar month is the traditional Chinese Wufan Festival. According to folklore, in order to get food, Mulian, a disciple of Sakyamuni, found a way to dye the rice with the juice of Nanzhu leaves, cooked it into black rice and sent it to the hungry ghosts. The hungry ghosts did not dare to eat the black rice. The mother finally had enough to eat, and the people ate black rice every year to commemorate the filial son Mulian. "New Compendium of Materia Medica" records: Nanzhuye is the leaf of the Rhododendron plant Wufanshu.

5. Foot-bone bamboo shoots

In the Beginning of Summer, Ningbo people like to eat foot-bone bamboo shoots. These slender wild bamboo shoots are a symbol of hope and health.

People in Ningbo call it "foot bone bamboo shoots" and people in Fenghua call it mother bamboo shoots. They are a kind of wild mountain bamboo shoots with a particularly good taste.

It is said that if you eat it at the beginning of summer, it can grow like bamboo shoots every day. There is an old saying in Ningbo, "Eating foot bone bamboo shoots at the beginning of summer will keep your foot bones strong throughout the year."

6. Wheat silkworms

Green wheat dumplings are green wheat silkworms, which are called Lengzhen in Tongdong dialect and belong to the tradition of Shadi people (now Haimen City and Qidong City, Jiangsu Province) snacks. Nowadays, this kind of snack is rare and fewer and fewer people make it. Old times. Farmers generally live in poverty, and every February and March is the time when "the gods are sad". The food at home was almost gone, so I cut the green wheat ears in the field and took them home. I rubbed the green wheat seeds with my hands and blew off the wheat husks, then put them in the pot and fried them until cooked. Clean the wheat husks again (because the wheat husks cannot be cleaned once). After frying it in the pot, use a stone mill to grind the wheat grains into fine strips while it's hot. Because it looks like a young silkworm, people in the desert call it wheat silkworm.

7. Qijia Porridge

A must-eat "Qijia Porridge" at the beginning of summer in rural areas of Zhejiang, also called "Qijia Tea". Qijia porridge is made by collecting rice from neighboring families, adding various beans and brown sugar, and cooking it into a big pot of porridge for everyone to share. For Qijia Tea, each family brings their newly roasted tea leaves, mixes them, cooks or brews them into a large pot of tea, and then everyone gathers together to drink it. Every time at the beginning of summer, Hangzhou people cook fresh food and prepare fruit cakes. They serve tea and give gifts to relatives and neighbors, which is called "eating seven teas at the beginning of summer".

8. Qijia Tea

It is an old custom in Hangzhou to cook new tea at the beginning of summer. Relatives and neighbors call it Qijia Tea. Mingtian Rucheng's "West Lake Tour Zhiyu·Xi Dynasty Pleasures": "On the day of the Beginning of Summer, each family cooks new tea, garnishes it with various colorful fruits, and sends it to relatives and neighbors. It is called Qijia Tea. Rich families compete for luxury, and the fruits are all carved. , decorated with gold foil, and the fragrant soup has names such as jasmine, forest bird, rose, cinnamon, clove, and apricot. It is served in a Geru porcelain pot and is only for one sip. ”

9. Guang Cake

In Guangzhou, Henan (now Huangchuan, Henan), there is also a kind of charcoal grilled "fire steamed bun" ("roasted steamed bun"). It involves mixing the dough, cutting it into pieces, rolling it into rounds and flattening it, then brushing it with water and sticking it on the charcoal stove for grilling.

Some are sweet, some are salty, and some are neither sweet nor salty. The appearance, color, and size are exactly the same as Fuzhou Guangbing, except that the hole in the center of the cake is missing for threading.

In Guangzhou during the Tang Dynasty, the genealogy of the Fuzhou people who migrated south from the Central Plains records that their ancestors came from Guangzhou. It can be inferred that since the Tang Dynasty, Fuzhou has had "fired buns" ("roasted buns"), which are called "guangbing" because they come from Guangzhou.

"Guang Cake" is a traditional snack in Fuzhou. In ancient times, Fuzhou scholars would often carry "Guang Cake" with them when they went to Beijing to take exams, as it was easy to carry, eat, and eat. Preserved, it became a high-quality and low-priced "three-point dry food".

10. Prawn Noodles

The beginning of summer usually falls in early April in the lunar calendar and in mid-May in the Gregorian calendar. On this day, every household in southern Fujian used to mix red glutinous rice into noodles and cook it for the whole family to eat. Because red glutinous rice is red, it is an auspicious color, and it has fermentation effect, which means it means prosperity and wealth. Red glutinous rice grains also help digestion. Good for your health. This custom evolved later, and red glutinous rice was replaced by sea shrimp, which was called "eating shrimp noodles". After the shrimps are cooked, they turn red and have the same color as red shrimps, which is a wish for summer.

On the day of the Beginning of Summer, many married daughters prepare pork, pork tripe, pork loin, egg noodles, noodles and other items for their parents to eat, which is called "Suxia". This is a way to show filial piety to your parents.

Coastal fishermen pay special attention to the weather on the "Beginning of Summer" day. If it rains on this day, it will be greatly detrimental to the fishermen's fishing operations, resulting in a poor harvest throughout the year. Farmers, on the other hand, regard the rainfall in the Beginning of Summer as a good omen. As the proverb goes: "Rainfall is the worst of summer, and those who work in the fields are really like emperors." This means that abundant rain in summer can ensure a bumper harvest.

11. Tan Cui

In the Beginning of Summer, the powder made from cauliflower or jujube lard and rice is called "Tan Cuo". Eat it in the Beginning of Summer to prevent diseases and drive away disasters.

The "Song of Qu Songs in Shanghai", which records the customs of Shanghai in the Qing Dynasty, says: "At the beginning of summer, when you cut wild vegetables, there are so-called 'caozitou'. Grind the rice to make rice cakes, add the caozitou and fry it. The taste is very crisp and fragrant, and it is called 'Tan Cui'." The "Cao Zi Tou" mentioned in the article is the modern "Cao Tou", which is the young leaves of alfalfa. "In dialect, it refers to spreading soft or pasty food into sheets for frying. Nowadays, Shanghainese mix flour or rice noodles into a sticky shape and then put them in a pot to fry or bake them into pancakes. They call them "pancakes", while in old Shanghai The language talks about making "pancakes"; Liu Ruoyu of the Ming Dynasty said in "Zuizhongzhi·Good Food Shang Jilue": "Every household uses millet flour and jujube cakes, fried in oil; 'Xunfong'. "This "stall" means evenly spread into thin slices. Caotou is still a vegetable that Shanghainese like to eat today, but most of them are stir-fried as "wine herb head" or used as a base for meat dishes, such as "Caotou circle". Shanghainese have long forgotten that our ancestors had It is the custom to eat "Cao Tou Tan Cuo" on the Beginning of Summer. However, the foods that ancient people thought were delicious may not necessarily be popular with today’s people.

12. Tender broad beans

The beginning of summer marks the departure of spring and the beginning of summer, so this day was also called "Spring End Day" in ancient times, which is the day when spring ends. Traditionally, people often regard the Beginning of Summer as an important solar term when the temperature rises significantly, the heat is approaching, thunderstorms increase, and crops enter the peak season. As the saying goes, "spring brings forth summer, long autumn harvests, and winter stores." On such a special day as the beginning of summer, Shaoxing people have customs such as eating beans, eggs, and weighing, which all contain the ancient people's good wishes for a safe summer.

13. Tasting three delicacies

Wuxi people have always had the custom of tasting three delicacies during the summer heat. The three delicacies are divided into three delicacies: ground delicacies, tree delicacies and water delicacies. The three fresh delicacies of the ground refer to luffa, shepherd's purse, and cowpea; the three delicacies of the tree refer to cherries, loquats, and apricots; and the three delicacies of the water refer to field snails, anchovies, and puffer fish.

14. Lixia fruit

Lixia fruit, also known as Lixia_, is a characteristic food of the Lixia solar term in Yiyang, Jiangxi. On the day of Beginning of Summer, every household cooks a big iron pot called Beginning of Summer and eats it all day long. Beginning of summer is made by boiling rice and kneading it into small balls, then adding bean sprouts, dried tofu, shrimp skin, lentils and other foods to make "Lixia", also called Lixia soup. It is said that eating Beginning of Summer means welcoming spring and welcoming summer. The larger the variety, the more colorful and joyful the spring harvest will be.