What has our ancestors had for their New Year’s Eve dinner for more than two thousand years?

It’s New Year’s Eve again, we stay up all night, feast on the New Year’s Eve and listen to the music of the Song of Peony.

For Chinese people, the most important meal of the year is the New Year’s Eve dinner.

Family members who are away from home rush back home before New Year's Eve. If there are some who haven't returned, the family will leave an empty seat on the table and put a pair of chopsticks to show reunion. Therefore, the New Year's Eve dinner is also called the reunion dinner or the reunion dinner.

In view of this, the New Year's Eve dinner is naturally very rich, with chicken, duck, fish, meat, meat and vegetables, fruits and vegetables, and countless fine wines and delicacies. In addition to the New Year's Eve dinner, northerners cook dumplings, while southerners serve snacks such as rice cakes, each with its own merits.

Image source: Qianku.com

New Year's Eve dinner in my country has a history of more than 2,000 years. It has gone through a process from being simple and crude to taking shape and then to being fully mature. The reasons for its changes are closely related to productivity and technological levels.

Simple and rough in the Han and Jin Dynasties

New Year's Eve originated from the year-end sacrificial activities and is closely related to the agricultural production of ancestors.

Before the Qin Dynasty, New Year's Eve did not refer to the last night of December. In the Shang Dynasty, it was the last night of the eleventh lunar month, in the Zhou Dynasty, it was the last night of the tenth lunar month, and after Qin Shihuang unified the six kingdoms, it was set as the last night of the ninth lunar month. During this period, due to the low level of productivity, low grain production, and fewer types of vegetables and fruits, ordinary people and ordinary minor nobles were all vegetarians, and the New Year's Eve dinner was just a little larger than usual.

It is recorded that people often cook millet, sorghum and millet (these three kinds of millet are millet or yellow rice) in large amounts to make the New Year's Eve dinner , one reason being that the family can eat more, and the other is to indicate that there will be surplus food in the coming year and they won't have to worry about food.

In 104 BC, the historian Sima Qian and others proposed that Emperor Wu of the Western Han Dynasty issue an order to formulate the Taichu Calendar, which officially confirmed that the twelfth month of the lunar calendar was the twelfth month, and that sacrificial activities would be held, with New Year's Eve being the last night of the twelfth month. With the rise of the landlord class, in order to encourage tenants to continue to work hard on the land the following year, the landlords prepared wine and food on New Year's Eve to entertain tenants, housekeepers, and others. This was the prototype of the New Year's Eve dinner.

The Taichu calendar first proposed the "La Yue" (the twelfth lunar month). This is the original text of "Historical Records" (Source: Kong Fuzi Used Books Network)

During the Wei and Jin Dynasties, the custom of staying up late on New Year's Eve and eating New Year's Eve dinner was basically formed. During the Jin Dynasty, the New Year's Eve dinner of ordinary people was very simple, with a few side dishes, a portion of mutton or pork, and a pot of Tusu wine. The family sat together and celebrated the New Year. Tusu wine is a must for the New Year's Eve dinner. It is made by soaking rotten grass, platycodon, pepper, asarum, etc. in yellow wine for seven days. It has the effects of warming the yang, dispelling wind, and dispelling cold.

It began to take shape during the Tang and Song dynasties

After the development during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the New Year's Eve dinner began to take shape during the Tang and Song Dynasties.

The citizens of Chang'an, the capital of the Tang Dynasty, divided the New Year's Eve dinner into three parts:

The first procedure is to drink pepper and cypress wine (that is, wine soaked with pepper and cypress leaves respectively), which is a modified Tusu wine, which means praying for illness and longevity;

The second order is to serve the "Five Spicy Dishes" . The so-called Five Spicy Dishes refer to five spicy side dishes, namely green onions, garlic, leeks, Brassica juncea, and coriander. Some of the side dishes have changed in later generations.

The third procedure is to serve meat dishes, mainly lamb and fish . There are two points to note about the third procedure: first, there can be no carp on the table, because the emperor's surname is "Li"; second, there can be no beef on the table, because cattle are the main force for farming, and those who kill cattle will be severely punished.

Five Spicy Dishes from the Tang Dynasty (Source: China Food Culture Network)

During the Song Dynasty , due to the improvement of productivity, the New Year's Eve dinner became richer, with meat dishes being the most prominent.

The first meat dish was mutton. As the northern nomadic peoples moved south during the Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, the scale of sheep farming expanded, and mutton became the main dish on the table of the Song people, similar to pork today. According to historical records, tens of thousands of sheep were slaughtered in the palace every year during the reign of Emperor Zhenzong of Song.

In addition to mutton, the must-have meat dish for the New Year's Eve dinner of the Song Dynasty is "fish sashimi", which means "abundance every year". The original meaning of "sashimi" is finely chopped meat or fish, and in the Song Dynasty it specifically refers to "raw fish slices". The method of making fish sashimi is as follows: take the spine of a large carp or perch, cut it into thin slices, add chives, aged vinegar, pepper salt, etc., and eat it raw on the New Year's Eve dinner table. According to the "Compilation of the Three Dynasties of the Northern Alliance", the fish sashimi in the court of the Song Dynasty included dozens of types such as "red silk crystal sashimi" and "fresh shrimp hoof sashimi", which were deeply loved by royal aristocrats.

Similar to today's sashimi, source: Qianku.com

The North-South Difference in the Ming and Qing Dynasties

The sophistication of the New Year's Eve dinner matured during the Ming and Qing dynasties , with the formation of glutinous rice balls in the south and dumplings in the north.

It is only an anecdote that Zhang Zhongjing (from Nanyang, Henan), the medical saint of the Han Dynasty, invented dumplings. Historical records show that the prototype of dumplings only appeared in the Tang Dynasty. In the Song Dynasty, people called them "jiaozi" and in the Yuan Dynasty, people called them "bianshi" (old northerners still call them that). According to legend, northerners' eating of dumplings is related to Zhu Yuanzhang, the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty. After Zhu Yuanzhang, who came from the common people, became emperor, he was not used to court dishes, so he listed dumplings as one of the main dishes. Dumplings have become a symbol of the New Year in the north, and dumplings are the main dish for the New Year's Eve dinner in Henan, Shandong and other places. Gathering together to make dumplings has become the warmest record of family affection in the north.

Southerners are talented, and the most obvious example is that all 52 people who passed the imperial examination in the 30th year of Hongwu (1397 AD) of the Ming Dynasty were from the south. The clever and particular southerners believe that glutinous rice balls symbolize "reunion" and are auspicious, which is in line with people's desire to bid farewell to the old and usher in the new, so glutinous rice balls are the main dish for the New Year's Eve dinner.

During the Qing Dynasty, the nomadic Manchu people liked meat and dairy products, so they advocated making a big New Year's Eve dinner and eating glutinous rice balls or dumplings on the first day of the first lunar month. This custom continues to this day, and the southerners keep it the best, that is, making a big New Year's Eve dinner and eating glutinous rice balls on the morning of the first day of the first lunar month.

According to the Qing Palace Dietary Archives, the New Year's Eve dinner in the 49th year of Emperor Qianlong's reign included 63 meat dishes, including pork, chicken, duck, fish, shrimp, lamb, deer, and beef, as well as eight fruits, twelve dim sum buns, and four southern and northern side dishes. It was extremely sumptuous. This New Year's Eve dinner was the prototype of the famous "Manchu-Han Banquet." The royal family followed suit, and the people naturally followed suit. The New Year's Eve dinner shifted from "rice" to "dishes" , thus laying the foundation for the basic characteristics of the New Year's Eve dinner from the Republic of China to the present, which is rich, rich, and showy.

Image source: China Food Culture Network

It is worth mentioning that the term "New Year's Eve dinner" was born during the Jiaqing and Daoguang periods of the Qing Dynasty. Suzhou scholar Gu Lu wrote in "Qing Jia Lu": "On New Year's Eve, every family holds a banquet, and the young and old gather together, saying auspicious words. It is called 'New Year's Eve dinner', commonly known as 'family reunion'."

Snacks with fruits

If meat and vegetable dishes are the main themes of the New Year's Eve dinner, then the rich and varied snacks and delicious fruits are the best decoration for the dinner.

Rice cake is one of the representative snacks for the New Year's Eve dinner. It is loved by people because of its homophonic meaning "climbing high every year". Rice cake is usually made of sticky crops (such as glutinous rice). The famous cookbook "Food Classic" tells us that more than 1,600 years ago, people in the Northern and Southern Dynasties included white cocoon candy (the predecessor of rice cake) in the menu of the New Year's Eve dinner. To this day, rice cake is still popular in the south.

Red bean rice cake (Photo source: Food World)

People in the Tang and Song dynasties were very particular about snacks for the New Year's Eve dinner. According to "Wulin Jiushi", snacks in Bianjing, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, included fried honey, fried sugar, and glutinous rice (maltose).

Different times have seen different fruits enjoyed by Chinese people at New Year's Eve dinners. Before the Han Dynasty, the fruits on the New Year's Eve dinner table included peaches, plums, dates, etc. During the Han Dynasty, Zhang Qian traveled to the Western Regions and brought back grapes, pomegranates, cucumbers, etc., which added a lot of color to the New Year's Eve dinner. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, with the arrival of colonists from European countries, Western fruits such as pineapples and strawberries were gradually introduced into my country, and the fruits for the New Year's Eve dinner formed their own system.

The indispensable sense of ritual during the Chinese New Year

Times are changing, and Chinese people have higher and higher requirements for New Year's Eve dinner. Nowadays, urban people like to choose to have New Year's Eve dinner in hotels or restaurants, and pay special attention to the dining environment; rural people prepare a sumptuous banquet at home, toasting and watching the Spring Festival Gala, and the whole family is happy, which is the happiest moment of the year.

Image source: Qianku.com

No matter how it changes, the New Year's Eve dinner is still an important part of our traditional culture. It not only provides an opportunity for family members to communicate with each other, but also is an important ceremony to bid farewell to the old and usher in the new, and it carries the good wishes of the Chinese people. This is the most profound cultural significance of the New Year's Eve dinner for more than 2,000 years!

References:

1. Article "The Origin of Spring Festival Food", author Li Ping, "Modern Agriculture" No. 2, 2003

2. Book "Spring Festival and New Year's Eve", author Chen Xiuling, Dong Sheng, Jilin Publishing House, published in February 2014

3. Paper "Research on the Documents of New Year's Eve Sacrifice Customs", author Yuan Meng, "Folk Culture Forum" April 2020

Author: Wei Deyong, member of Shenzhen Writers Association, Guangdong