The custom, origin and significance of eating moon cakes in Lantern Festival

The traditional food of Mid-Autumn Festival is moon cakes, which are round, symbolizing reunion and reflecting people's good wishes for family reunion. Eating moon cakes in the Mid-Autumn Festival is said to have started in the Yuan Dynasty. At that time, Zhu Yuanzhang led the Han people to resist the tyranny of the Yuan Dynasty, agreed on the August 15th uprising, and put a note in the moon cake to convey the news. The custom of eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival spread among the people.

Later, Zhu Yuanzhang finally overthrew the Yuan Dynasty and became the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty. Although the Qing people later entered China, people still celebrated this festival, which symbolized the overthrow of alien rule.

According to legend, in ancient China, the emperor had a system of offering sacrifices to the sun in spring and the moon in autumn. In the folk, every Mid-Autumn Festival in August, there is also a custom about Yue Bai or offering sacrifices to the moon. The famous proverb "The moon is full on August 15th, and the Mid-Autumn moon cake is sweet and fragrant" tells the custom of urban and rural people to eat moon cakes on Mid-Autumn night. At first, moon cakes were used to worship the moon god. Later, people gradually regarded Mid-Autumn Festival as a symbol of family reunion, and mooncakes gradually became holiday gifts.

Moon cakes originally originated from Zhu Jie food in the Tang Dynasty. During the reign of Tang Gaozu, General Li Jing conquered the Huns and returned home in triumph on August 15.

Turpan people who were doing business at that time presented cakes to the emperor of the Tang Dynasty. Gaozu Li Yuan took the gorgeous cake box, took out the round cake, smiled at the bright moon in the sky and said, "We're going to invite toads with Hu cakes." After that, share the cake with the ministers.

The word "moon cake" has been used in the book Liang Lumeng written by Wu in the Southern Song Dynasty, but the description of enjoying the moon and eating moon cakes in the Mid-Autumn Festival is recorded in the West Lake Travel Agency in the Ming Dynasty: "August 15th is the Mid-Autumn Festival, and people take moon cakes as a legacy to get the meaning of reunion". In the Qing Dynasty, there were more records about moon cakes, and the production became more and more elaborate.

With the development of moon cakes today, there are more varieties and different tastes. Among them, Beijing-style, Soviet-style, Cantonese-style and Chaozhou-style moon cakes are deeply loved by people all over the country.

Moon cakes symbolize reunion and are a must-eat food for the Mid-Autumn Festival. On holiday nights, people also like to eat some reunion fruits, such as watermelons, and wish their families a happy, sweet and safe life.