Tianjin dumplings’ New Year’s Eve dumplings

Making dumplings on New Year’s Eve is one of the most important contents of the Chinese New Year in the vast areas of northern my country. Dumplings on New Year's Eve are an important part of the festival, so there are many rules and customs. These customs are all to match the atmosphere of the New Year. The first thing to pay attention to when making dumplings is to mix the dumpling fillings. Dumpling fillings can be either meat or vegetable, and in some places they are strictly differentiated, but most of them are a combination of meat and vegetable. The dumplings made on New Year's Eve should be enough for the whole family to eat on the night of the New Year's Eve and on the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year. The stuffing of dumplings on New Year's Eve is usually a combination of meat and vegetables. Pork or mutton is used, cut into small dices, marinated with seasonings, then chop the young cabbage leaves into coarse pieces with a knife, squeeze out part of the water, and add human meat. Mixed with fillings and seasonings. In the process of making stuffing, the most important thing is to chop the stuffing, which is the process of finely chopping the Chinese cabbage with a knife. When chopping vegetables, the knife collides with the chopping board, making a powerful "bang bang" sound. Because the force is constantly changing, the sound emits a rhythmic change of strong and weak rhythm, like a particularly beautiful piece of music. Neighbors all around. Everyone hopes that the sound of chopping vegetables at home is the loudest and longest in the village. Meat and vegetables are mixed with stuffing, which is homophonic to "have wealth". The sound of chopping the stuffing is the loudest and takes a long time, which means "you will have more money for a long time". The longer it takes to chop vegetables, the more dumplings will be made, which symbolizes a prosperous and prosperous life. The shape of dumplings is also particular when it comes to making dumplings on New Year's Eve. Most areas are accustomed to maintaining the traditional crescent shape. When making this shape, fold the dough in half and knead it along the semicircular edge with the thumb and index finger of your right hand. Knead it carefully and evenly, which is called "kneading blessing". Some farmers pinch the two corners of a crescent-shaped dumpling together to form a "yuanbao" shape and place it on the curtain, symbolizing wealth everywhere and the house full of gold and silver. Some farmers also knead the dumplings with wheat ear-shaped patterns, like plump and huge ears of wheat, symbolizing a bumper harvest in the new year. But more importantly, the dumplings are wrapped in several shapes, which indicates that the house will be full of wealth, the warehouse will be full of grain, and the life will be prosperous in the coming year. The dumplings placed on New Year's Eve are exquisite not only in their shape, but also in their placement. First of all, it cannot be placed randomly. As the saying goes: "You are so busy that you don't let the dumplings go around." When making dumplings every day, you can arrange them horizontally or vertically as you like, but this cannot be done for the New Year's Eve dumplings. In Shandong and other places, round curtains are used. First, a few ingot-shaped dumplings are placed in the middle, and then arranged neatly layer by layer around the ingots. Folk custom goes like this: "encircling blessings." Some families even stipulate that no matter how big or small the curtains are, only 99 curtains can be placed on each curtain, and they must be covered with curtains. Therefore, it can only be achieved by adjusting the spacing and row spacing of dumplings, which is called "endless happiness." Regarding this custom, there is an interesting story in folklore: A long time ago, in a poor mountain village, there was a very poor family who often had no meal at all. On the New Year's Eve, there was no flour or vegetables at home. I listened to the sound of chopping vegetables all around and felt anxious. I had no choice but to borrow rice and noodles from relatives and friends. After making the noodles, I randomly mixed in some mixed vegetables to make the filling, and then made the dumplings. Because the noodles are borrowed, the dumplings are especially precious. When placed, they are placed in a circle from the inside to the outside, very neat and beautiful. The Kitchen God, who had just returned from heaven, was very happy to see it. There was a rich man in the same village. His family had a fortune. He was used to eating delicacies from all over the world, so he didn't take dumplings seriously at all. On New Year's Eve, stuffings with meat, eggs and other ingredients are used to make dumplings and placed randomly on the curtain. After the dumplings are cooked, their taste changes completely. Pork filling turned into radish dish. But that poor family's dumplings turned out to be stuffed with meat and eggs. It turned out that the Kitchen God was very dissatisfied with the rich man's attitude towards making dumplings. In order to punish him, he secretly mixed the dumplings from the two families. The next day, the news spread in the village. From then on, no matter how busy people are, the New Year's Eve dumplings must be arranged neatly to get a "lucky circle". But in farmers in some areas of Heilongjiang, dumplings cannot be placed in a circle. It is said that arranging dumplings in a circle will make the days worse and worse. They must be arranged in horizontal rows so that money can flow in all directions.