What to eat and drink on Double Ninth Festival

China has a very long history, so many traditional cultural festivals that have been passed down in China for thousands of years are still very popular in modern times. However, some traditional cultural festivals have been gradually eliminated with the passage of time, while some have been retained. The Double Ninth Festival is one of these traditional cultural festivals. The Double Ninth Festival is a festival to honor the elderly, so families need to reunite during this festival. So what should we eat and drink during the Double Ninth Festival?

Food customs of different regions during the Double Ninth Festival

1. Eat Chongyang Cake

Eat flower cake. On the Double Ninth Festival, people respect the elderly and climb high places to avoid disasters. "Gao" has the same pronunciation as "gao", and also has the meaning of "rising step by step", which is quite auspicious.

Two days before the Double Ninth Festival, people steamed cakes with flour, on which were inserted colorful flags and decorated with pomegranate seeds, chestnuts, ginkgo, pine nuts and other fruits; or they were made into the shape of a lion king and placed on the cake, which was called "Lion Chestnut Cake". These were the customs of Lin'an (now Hangzhou) during the Southern Song Dynasty. These chestnut cakes are exactly what we should take with us when we climb high places.

The most famous Double Ninth Festival cake in the north is the steamed cake with flowers and fruits made from leavened dough (also known as steamed cake). To make steamed cakes, ferment the flour and put it into small bowls. Put various flowers and fruits at the bottom of each bowl, such as red dates, nuts, candied fruits, red silk, green silk, etc. Steam the cakes until cooked and then pour them out, so that all the flowers and fruits are on top of the cakes in the shape of steamed buns. The Chongyang cake made from leavened dough is soft, sweet, and very delicious.

In some places in our country, this custom still exists: during the Double Ninth Festival, married daughters return to their parents' home to give them Double Ninth Festival cakes, usually two big ones and nine small ones, to symbolize the reunion of the two ninths. The folk song circulating in rural areas in the north, "Mid-Autumn Festival has just passed, and we are busy preparing for Double Ninth Festival. The colorful cakes are made just for girls who miss their mothers," reflects this custom and folk sentiment.

2. Eating glutinous rice cakes

Eating glutinous rice cakes is another food custom during the Double Ninth Festival in southwestern my country. Ciba is divided into two types: soft and sweet, and hard and salty. The method is to put the washed glutinous rice into a pot of boiling water, scoop it out as soon as it boils, steam it in a steamer, then put it in a mortar and mash it, and knead it into a ball. When eating, fry the sesame seeds, mash them into fine powder, roll the glutinous rice cake into strips, pinch them into small pieces, and mix them with sesame seeds, sugar, etc. It tastes sweet and delicious, and is called "soft glutinous rice cake" (best eaten warm). Hard glutinous rice cake is also called "oil glutinous rice cake". The method is to steam the glutinous rice but do not mash it. Put it on the table and knead it into a ball. After rolling it out, add some salt and pepper powder to make the "filling". Then roll it into strips and slice it, and then fry it in a pan. The result is golden and beautiful, salty, spicy, crispy and has an endless aftertaste.

3. Eat persimmons

There is a legend about the custom of eating persimmons among the Chinese people. According to the introduction in "Strange Gardens and Strange Places", one year, Emperor Taizu of Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang, went out of the city in disguise for a private visit, and that day happened to be the Double Ninth Festival. He had not eaten for a day and felt hungry and thirsty. When he arrived at Shengchai Village, he saw collapsed walls and withered trees in every house, all of which were burned by war. Zhu Yuanzhang sighed inwardly and looked around. There was only one persimmon tree in the northeast corner that was ripe. So he picked some and ate them. After eating about 10, he felt full and left after a long moment of melancholy. In the summer of Yiwei, Taizu attacked Caishi (now Caishiji, Ma'anshan City, Anhui Province) and took Taiping (now Taiping County, Anhui Province). On the way, he saw the persimmon trees still standing here. He told his courtiers about his previous visit incognito and eating persimmons here, and issued an edict: "Confer the title of Lingshuang Hou on Shi, and order all people in the world to eat persimmons on the Double Ninth Festival to commemorate him.

4. Eat beef

There is also a custom of eating beef on the Double Ninth Festival throughout the country. As a warm food, it is the right time for the elderly to eat it in autumn. Nutritionists tell us that fresh beef and mutton are warm foods and are more easily absorbed by the human body when eaten in autumn, satisfying people's desire to "put on weight" to get through the cold winter.

5. Crab

The Double Ninth Festival falls in September. The autumn chrysanthemums are fragrant, the crab roe is yellow and delicious, and the meat is tender. It is a great season to eat crabs. An ancient poet had a poem that goes, "If you don't go to Mount Lushan, you'll be wasting your eyes; if you don't eat crabs, you'll be wasting your stomach." Mei Yaochen, a poet in the Song Dynasty, wrote a poem praising crabs, "The flavor of the crabs has been taken away from the cup, and the water shield soup I had that day was in vain." Therefore, to this day, the steamed hairy crabs from Yangcheng Lake are famous both at home and abroad, and are listed as a September seasonal delicacy in major restaurants in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, and enjoy a very high reputation. No wonder the famous scholar Zhang Taiyan and his wife once lived in Wuzhong. After eating crabs, his wife Ms. Tang Guoli once recited a poem: "If Yangcheng Lake crabs were not good, there would be no need to live in Suzhou." Throughout the ages, many literati and poets have eaten, tasted, and painted crabs, leaving behind many anecdotes and elegant stories for future generations, adding a bit of charm to people's eating of crabs.

Today's Double Ninth Festival has a new meaning. In 1989, my country designated the Double Ninth Festival as Senior Citizens' Day. Nine is a large number, implying health and longevity. It combines tradition with modernity and gives the Double Ninth Festival new content of respecting and loving the elderly. As a traditional festival, people from ancient times to the present have carried out activities such as respecting the elderly, celebrating birthdays and climbing high places to see the distant views on this day.

6. Drink chrysanthemum wine

Drink "chrysanthemum wine" on Double Ninth Festival. Jiujiu and "Jiujiu" People also call September "Chrysanthemum Month" or "Chrysanthemum Festival". Therefore, appreciating chrysanthemums is an indispensable activity during the Double Ninth Festival. It has the same pronunciation as “酒”, which is why the saying “九九日要喝chrysanthemum wine” comes into being. The historical meaning is: it is considered to be a compliment for longevity and immortality.

In ancient times, chrysanthemum wine was regarded as an "auspicious wine" that must be drunk on the Double Ninth Festival to ward off disasters and pray for blessings. The production of chrysanthemum wine has been popular in my country since the Han and Wei dynasties. According to "Xijing Miscellaneous Notes", "When chrysanthemums bloom, people pick their stems and leaves and mix them with millet to make a wine. It is ripe on September 9th of the following year and people drink it, so it is called chrysanthemum wine." Poets have a special liking for chrysanthemum wine and praise it highly. Tao Yuanming of the Jin Dynasty wrote in a poem: "The departing swallows leave no trace, but the returning geese leave their cries. Wine can cure all diseases, and chrysanthemum can prevent aging." The "Jingchu Sui Shi Ji" also states: "On September 9, wearing dogwood, eating lotus follicles, and drinking chrysanthemum wine can make people live longer."

Besides appreciating chrysanthemums, drinking chrysanthemum wine is naturally the first choice.

7. Drink scented tea

Green tea. Eating too much food must go through a series of digestion and filtering in the intestines. Only tea, a healthy, green drink, can do that.