What traditional snacks are there in Lantern Festival?

Just after the Spring Festival holiday, it ushered in the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the first month. As the saying goes, the fifteenth day of the first month is full of lanterns. According to the traditional folk custom in China, today people not only watch lanterns and solve riddles on the lanterns, but also have a family reunion to eat Yuanxiao, which means that the New Year reunion is sweet. China has a vast territory, and the dietary customs vary from place to place. What are the traditional dishes of Lantern Festival?

Tangyuan 1

Southerners eat jiaozi mainly to pray for family reunion. The glutinous rice used to make glutinous rice balls is flat in nature and sweet in taste, and has the functions of tonifying deficiency, regulating blood, invigorating spleen and appetizing, benefiting qi and stopping diarrhea, warming middle warmer, promoting fluid production and moistening dryness. In addition, the conventional fillings of various glutinous rice balls are mainly fruits and dried fruits, including sesame seeds, walnuts and peanuts, and vegetable oil has a "higher" nutritional value. Boiling jiaozi in water is the easiest way and the healthiest way to eat it.

2. Lantern Festival

People in the north eat Yuanxiao, which is a kind of food cooked and eaten by people in China on the 15th day of the first lunar month and the Spring Festival. There used to be various names, such as cocoon, pink fruit, ingot, soup cake, rounded corner and so on. In Yongle period of Ming Dynasty, it was officially named Yuanxiao.

Many people think that glutinous rice balls are Yuanxiao. Although there is little difference in raw materials and appearance between Yuanxiao and Tangyuan, they are actually two things with essential differences.

manufacturing process

The "Rolling" Lantern Festival in the North

Making Yuanxiao is much more complicated than making dumplings: first, you need to cut the mixed and solidified stuffing into small pieces, water it once, then throw it into a basket full of glutinous rice flour and roll it, water it again, and then put it back in the basket and roll it several times until the stuffing is covered with glutinous rice flour and rolled into a ball. In addition, Yuanxiao can be boiled, steamed and fried. Especially fried Yuanxiao, the glutinous rice flour outside will swell after frying. Biting glutinous rice is particularly sticky, and the filling will flow out by itself, which is particularly slippery.

South baotangyuan

The method of making glutinous rice balls is a bit like wrapping jiaozi: first, add water to glutinous rice flour to make balls (like jiaozi Zhonghe noodles), and then grab a small ball of wet noodles with your hands and squeeze it into a circle. Pick a ball of stuffing and put it on the glutinous rice slices, then turn it with both hands to make the glutinous rice balls. Usually, dumplings in the south can only be cooked.

taste

Because of the different production techniques, Yuanxiao is thicker than Tangyuan. After the Yuanxiao is cooked, the soup will be thicker, like glutinous rice porridge, with soft skin and hard stuffing that "bites" people, with rich fruit and rice fragrance, and jiaozi will be softer.

The biggest feature of Yuanxiao is sweetness, and there are relatively few kinds of fillings, mainly black sesame seeds, five kernels and red bean paste. , plus some sugar. Tangyuan is different, except sweet and salty, with stuffing and stuffing.

3. jiaozi

On the fifteenth day of the first month, northerners have the habit of eating jiaozi, while people in Henan have the custom and tradition of "fifteen flats and sixteen circles" for Lantern Festival, so they should eat jiaozi on the fifteenth day of the first month. Jiaozi is a folk food with a long history and is deeply loved by people. There is a folk saying "delicious but not as good as jiaozi".

4. Lantern Festival tea

In Shaanxi and other places, there is a custom of eating Yuanxiao tea, that is, putting all kinds of vegetables and fruits in hot soup noodles, much like the ancient "Yuanxiao porridge". This kind of tea increases the intake of cellulose, minerals and vitamins, and is not as greasy as ordinary Yuanxiao. It has a neutralizing effect on the acidic constitution caused by eating more animal food in festivals, and also makes Yuanxiao more comprehensive in nutrition.

5. Noodles

There is a folk proverb in Jiangbei, which is called "Shangyuan Festival, save noodles, and look forward to next year after eating." Local people eat noodles on the fifteenth night of the first month, which sounds unrelated to the Lantern Festival, but it also means praying for good luck. "Annals of the Emblem" states: "On the 18th day of the first month, the lights go out and people spit on their faces. As the saying goes,' when the light is on, it goes out', and everyone celebrates. " Eating noodles with lights out symbolizes continuous celebration.

6. Lettuce; lettuce

Cantonese people like to "steal" lettuce and cook it with cakes during the Lantern Festival. It is said that this kind of food represents good luck. Guangdong people are calm and down-to-earth, and have good intentions for festivals. Lettuce, which is most commonly used in festive occasions such as the opening of new stores, is also an essential holiday product for the Lantern Festival. Lettuce often becomes a common vegetable on the southern dining table, which is homophonic with "making money", so it is also regarded as a festive thing symbolizing wealth and good luck.

7, steamed bread, wheat cake

There is a custom of eating steamed bread and wheat cakes in Pujiang, Zhejiang Province during the Lantern Festival. It is said that the reason is that steamed bread is made of dough, and wheat cakes are round, which means "happy reunion of children and grandchildren". In Shangyuan County, Changde City, Hunan Province, it is called "time soup" to make soup with Chili peppers and add leeks and fruits to entertain guests.

8. Bad soup

Taizhou area eats rotten soup after watching lanterns on the fourteenth day of the first month every year. Stir-fry the soup with shredded pork, shredded winter bamboo shoots, mushrooms, fungus, fresh duck, dried bean curd, oil bubble, Sichuan bean board, spinach, etc. Add a little rice flour and cook it into a salty paste. The rotten soup drunk on the fifteenth day of the first month is sweet, made of sweet potato powder or lotus root powder with lotus seeds, candied dates and longan.

9, jujube cake

People in western Henan like to eat jujube cakes on the Lantern Festival, which means good luck. Jujube cake was originally the imperial cake of Qing Dynasty. It is sweet and fragrant, and contains vitamin C, protein, calcium, iron, vitamins and other nutrients, which can not only replenish the spleen and stomach, but also benefit qi and promote fluid production. It also has the functions of protecting the liver, increasing muscle strength, beautifying and preventing aging.

10, sticky cake

Sticky cakes are also called rice cakes. Besides Yuanxiao and noodles, some people eat sticky cakes on the Lantern Festival. Sun Simiao, a famous doctor in the Tang Dynasty, wrote in "Prescription for Emergency Use Dietotherapy" that "autotrophic rice is sweet, slightly cold, non-toxic, clearing heat and benefiting qi." After the Tang Dynasty, there were also records of eating cakes during the Lantern Festival in the Yuan Dynasty. Hope to adopt