Special and Essential Chinese New Year Food
For Chinese people, Spring Festival is the most important traditional festival. Since the eighth day of the 12th lunar month, housewives would be busy shopping for the Chinese New Year and purchase enough chicken, duck, fish, tea, wine, oil, sauce, roasted seeds and nuts, candies and fruits. In China, people think the food is the paramount necessity of the people. Then, what are the Chinese New Year foods? And what are their symbolic meanings?
The foods and dishes during the Spring Festival vary from place to place in south and north, and each has its own characteristics. The most common Chinese New Year foods include dumpling, rice glue ball, rice cake, wonton, longevity noodle, fish, hotpot etc. and each has special meanings.
Jiao Zi (Dumpling)
When to eat dumplings?
Dumpling is a kind of indispensable delicacy during the Chinese New Year. In North China, dumplings are a must for family reunion dinner but the custom varies from place to place. In some areas, dumplings are eaten on the Chinese New Year's Day while in some mountainous areas of North China, people take dumplings as breakfast from the 1st to the 5th day of the first lunar month.
What is dumplings made of and how to eat it?
To make dumplings, people need to knead dough first, make dumpling wrapper with it and then fill the wrapper with all sorts of stuffing, including meat, egg, seafood and vegetable. The traditional way to eat dumplings is boiling with clear water, taking out and eating with the mixing of vinegar, garlic, sesame oil and soy sauce. Some people would fry, steam or bake the dumplings.
What do dumplings signify?
Since ''knead'' and ''harmony'' are homophonous while ''dumpling'' and ''gathering'' are homophonous, dumpling is regarded as a symbol of family reunion and harmony. In Chinese language, the transfer from an old year to a New Year is also called ''Jiao Zi'' and it is the beginning of Chinese New Year. As a result, the custom of eating dumplings implies good luck and happiness. Besides, the shape of dumpling is similar to the gold ingot, so it also has the auspicious meaning of wealth and fortune.
There are many interesting ways to eat dumplings. Dumplings wrapped with some sugar imply the sweet life in the coming year; those with peanut imply the long life while the dumplings with jujube or chestnut have the symbolic meaning of baby birth. Some families would warp a coin into one of the dumplings and the family member who eats the dumpling is considered lucky. The dumplings cooked with noodles are called ''gold ingots connected with gold wires''.
Fish
Fish is an indispensable dish during the Chinese New Year. ''Fish'' and ''surplus'' sound the same in Chinese and it is also a symbol of warding off evil spirits. In South China, a whole fish must be offered at the Reunion Dinner yet it cannot be eaten up, for the meaning of surplus year after year. In some regions, the fish head and tail cannot be eaten, for the meaning of ''carrying things through to the end'' in the New Year.
Carp: good luck
It is derived from the folktale ''the carp leaping over the dragon gate'' and eating carp can add the joyous atmosphere. ''Carp'' sounds similar with ''gift'' in Chinese and people usually eat carp during the Spring Festival for the wish of good luck.
Crucian: good luck
''Crucian'' sounds the same with ''auspicious'' in Chinese. Chinese believe that eating crucian can bring them good luck.
Silver Carp: surplus year after year
The word ''Silver Carp'' and ''successive'' have the same pronunciation in Chinese. The custom of eating silver carp during the Chinese New Year is for the meaning of surplus year after year.
Tang Yuan (Glutinous Rice Balls)
Nian Gao (Glutinous Rice Cake)
Spring Rolls
Eight Delicacies Rice
Longevity Noodle
Also known as birthday noodles or long-life noodles, it has the symbolic meaning of living to 100 years.
People in some areas of China like those in southern Fujian Province have the tradition of eating noodles during the Spring Festival, for the meaning of ''long life and success year after year''.
People in some areas of China like those in southern Fujian Province have the tradition of eating noodles during the Spring Festival, for the meaning of ''long life and success year after year''.
Wonton
Wonton is a kind of traditional food made of flour that originated in northern China. With thin wrapper and meat stuffing (generally pork and leek or mutton and cabbage), wonton is cooked thoroughly and eaten with soup. In similar form with gold ingot, wonton is also named ''ingot soup'' and has the symbolic meaning of amassing fortunes and profits pouring in from all sides. On the second day of the first lunar year, people in north China usually worship the God of Wealth and take wonton as lunch.
Hot Pot
Chinese Calendar
| Su | Mo | Tu | We | Th | Fr | Sa |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30廿五/25 | 1廿六/26 | 2廿七/27 | 3廿八/28 | 4廿九/29 | 5三十/30 | 六月 (Jun) 6初壹/1 |
| 7初二/2 | 8初三/3 | 9初四/4 | 10初五/5 | 11初六/6 | 12初七/7 | 13初八/8 |
| 14初九/9 | 15初十/10 | 16十壹/11 | 17十二/12 | 18十三/13 | 19十四/14 | 20十五/15 |
| 21十六/16 | 22十七/17 | 23十八/18 | 24十九/19 | 25二十/20 | 26廿壹/21 | 27廿二/22 |
| 28廿三/23 | 29廿四/24 | 30廿五/25 | 31廿六/26 | 1廿七/27 | 2廿八/28 | 3廿九/29 |
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Lastest Questions and Answers
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Hi, we are opening a food kiosk business and I am a Year of the Dog and the Kiosk is facing towards the South, what are the good days to open the business in the 2nd half of September?
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Chinese New Year is way more interesting than Christmas-not a question (0 Reply ) Asked by D***n
You are not a western person, why are you biased towards the wrong side? You need to fix your website to admit that Spring Festival is celebrated on a bigger scale and has a more rich and longer history from ancient China. The western concept of Christmas copied and stole the red colour that was used 3,000 years ago for weddings in China and for CNY. Spring Festival is more meaningful and more important if you are Chinese. You should NEVER write that Christmas is like Chinese New Year because Christmas CANNOT compare. You cannot compare apples to oranges. Chinese New Year is more beautiful because we can be Buddhist and not be forced to become catholic, do NOT throw away your Chinese culture values. Christmas is only one day but Westerners are very greedy and celebrate it as early as November. Americans and Canadians LIE and pretend to preach about poor children or families who cannot put food not the table. Meanwhile, westerners in general use the most expense Christmas greedy decorations and buy too many plastic toys for their kids, not good. Christmas is usually just fun for children and not so much for adults. Chinese New Year is fun for children or adults and the amazing Chinese food tastes the best if you cook it right. Various westerners are jealous that I look very beautiful as a Chinese lady. Those white or brown people bully and give bad treatment to nice Chinese women who look pretty and if they are not corrupt. If the older married Asian women look ugly and are whitewashed and corrupt, they receive job promotions and get good treatment from westerners, this is wrong. Caucasian people are only nice towards Asian men because they want to STEAL and use fake ugly pornography FAT white women (fake slim bodies) to steal our Chinese men. Chinese songs and music are the BEST and sound better than English music usually. Some Chinese singers sound bad, others sound really good, but in general Oriental music has more variety (opera, pop music, ancient Chinese style, Cantonese, Mandarin, Chu Jow etc.) English music is just one language. The bad Chinese Australians and corrupt violent Hong Kong rioters are sinful to be influenced by anti-Chinese propaganda started by bad Americans and bad caucasian Canadians and certain evil East Indian people.
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