What is "brown seed"?

According to the historian Biography of Qu Yuan and Jia Sheng, Qu Yuan was a minister of Chu Huaiwang in the Spring and Autumn Period. He advocated the use of talents, empowerment, and prosperity, and advocated joint resistance to Qin, which was strongly opposed by others. Qu Yuan was forced to leave his post, was driven out of the capital and exiled to the Yuan and Xiang river basins. During his exile, he wrote immortal poems such as Li Sao, Tian Wen and Tian Wen, which have a unique style and far-reaching influence (therefore, the Dragon Boat Festival is also called the Poet's Day). In 278 BC, Qin Jun conquered Kyoto of Chu. Seeing that his motherland was invaded, Qu Yuan was heartbroken, but he was always reluctant to give up his motherland. On May 5th, after writing his masterpiece Huai Sha, he died in Miluo River and wrote a magnificent patriotic movement with his own life.

Legend has it that after Qu Yuan's death, the people of Chu were so sad that they flocked to the Miluo River to pay homage to Qu Yuan. The fisherman paddled the boat and fished for his real body back and forth on the river. A fisherman took out rice balls, eggs and other foods prepared for Qu Yuan and threw them into the river, saying that ichthyosaurs, shrimps and crabs were full and would not bite the doctor. People followed suit after seeing it. An old doctor took an altar of realgar wine and poured it into the river, saying that he would stun the dragon water beast with medicine so as not to hurt Dr. Qu. Later, people were afraid that rice balls would be eaten by dragons, so they came up with the idea of wrapping rice with neem leaves and then wrapping it with colored silk to make it develop into brown seeds.

After that, on the fifth day of May every year, there is the custom of dragon boat racing, eating zongzi and drinking realgar wine. In memory of the patriotic poet Qu Yuan.

Eat zongzi on Dragon Boat Festival. ※

Eating zongzi on Dragon Boat Festival is another traditional custom of China people. Zongzi, also known as "millet" and "Zongzi". It has a long history and various patterns.

According to records, as early as the Spring and Autumn Period, millet was wrapped into horns by leaves of zinia latifolia, which was called "horny millet". Rice packed in bamboo tubes is sealed and baked, which is called "tube zongzi". At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, millet soaked in plant ash water. Because the water contains alkali, the millet is wrapped in leaves into a quadrilateral, and when cooked, it becomes Guangdong sour rice dumplings.

In Jin Dynasty, Zongzi was officially designated as Dragon Boat Festival food. At this time, in addition to glutinous rice, jiaozi also added Alpinia oxyphylla, and the boiled jiaozi was called "Yizhi jiaozi". According to the "Yueyang Local Records" written by Zhou people, "It is customary to wrap the millet with leaves, cook it and cook it thoroughly. From May 5 to the summer solstice, one is Zongzi and the other is Xiaomi. " During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, miscellaneous zongzi appeared. Rice is mixed with animal meat, chestnuts, red dates, red beans and so on. And there are more and more varieties. Zongzi is also used as a gift for communication.

In the Tang Dynasty, the rice used for zongzi was "white as jade", and its shape appeared conical and rhombic. There is a record of "Da Tang Zongzi" in Japanese literature. In the Song Dynasty, there was already a "candied jiaozi", that is, fruits entered jiaozi. The poet Su Dongpo has a poem "See Yangmei in Zongzi". At this time, there were also advertisements for building pavilions and wooden chariots and horses with zongzi, indicating that eating zongzi was very fashionable in the Song Dynasty. In the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, the wrapping material of zongzi changed from leaves to leaves. Later, zongzi wrapped in reed leaves appeared, and additional materials such as bean paste, pork, pine nuts, dates and walnuts appeared, and the varieties were more colorful.

To this day, at the beginning of May every year, people in China have to soak glutinous rice, wash zongzi leaves and wrap zongzi, with more varieties of colors. From the perspective of stuffing, there are many dates in the north, such as jiaozi; There are many kinds of fillings in the south, such as red bean paste, fresh meat, ham and egg yolk, among which Zhejiang Jiaxing Zongzi is the representative. The custom of eating zongzi has been popular in China for thousands of years and spread to South Korea, Japan and Southeast Asian countries.

On the morning of the end of May, every family eats zongzi in memory of Qu Yuan. Usually it is wrapped the day before, cooked at night and eaten in the morning. Zongzi is mainly made of tender reed leaves and bamboo leaves, collectively called Zongzi leaves. ※. The traditional form of zongzi is a triangle, which is generally named after the inner pulp. Glutinous rice is called rice zongzi, red bean zongzi is called red bean zongzi, and jujube zongzi is called jujube zongzi. Jujube jiaozi homophones "junior high school", so it eats the most. Children who plan to study can win the championship early. In the past, Jinshi ate jujube jiaozi on the morning of taking the imperial examination. Up to now, on the morning of the entrance examination day in middle schools and universities, parents have to make jujube jiaozi for the candidates.

The origin of eating zongzi on Dragon Boat Festival

Here is an interesting legend. In 340 BC, Qu Yuan, a patriotic poet and doctor of Chu, faced the pain of national subjugation. On May 5th, he threw a big stone into Guluo River with grief and indignation. In order to prevent fish and shrimp from damaging his health, people have thrown rice in bamboo tubes into the river. In the future, people will put rice in bamboo tubes and throw it into the river to pay homage to Qu Yuan. This is the origin of China's earliest zongzi-"tube zongzi".

Why did you wrap zongzi with wormwood leaves or reed leaves and lotus leaves later? There is such a record in the Elementary Book: During the Jianwu period of the Han Dynasty, Changsha people dreamed of a man who claimed to be Dr. San Lv (the official name of Qu Yuan) at night and said to him, "Everything you sacrificed was stolen by the dragon in the river. You can wrap it with mugwort leaves and tie it with colorful silk thread in the future. Dragons are most afraid of these two things. " As a result, people made "corn millet" with "leaves wrapped in millet", which was passed down from generation to generation and gradually developed into the Dragon Boat Festival food in China.

Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty, after eating Jiuzi Zongzi in the palace during the Dragon Boat Festival, Long Yan was overjoyed and full of praise, and happily wrote a poem: "The four seasons are so beautiful, and Jiuzi Zongzi seeks novelty."

Jiuzi Zongzi is a kind of Zongzi, that is, nine Zongzi are connected in a string, big and small, with the big one above and the small one below. They have different shapes and are very beautiful. They are made of silk threads of nine colors. Jiuzi Zongzi is mostly used for gifts to relatives and friends, such as gifts from mothers to married daughters and gifts from mother-in-law to newly-married wives. Because "Zongzi" is homophonic with "neutron", there is a folk saying that eating "Zongzi" can give birth to a son.

Wu Manyun, a poet in the Qing Dynasty, also wrote a poem praising Jiuzi Zongzi: "Even the barrel of rice is wrapped in spring, and the colorful plumes of Jiuzi are re-tied, the green leaves are all white, and the lotus root of the smiling cook is loose."

Zongzi not only has many shapes and varieties, but also has different tastes in different places, mainly sweet and salty. Sweet dumplings include white dumplings, red bean dumplings, broad bean dumplings, red date dumplings, rose dumplings, melon seeds dumplings, red bean paste lard dumplings, jujube paste lard dumplings and so on. There are pork jiaozi, ham jiaozi, sausage jiaozi, shrimp dumplings, diced pork jiaozi and so on, but pork jiaozi is more common. In addition, there are assorted jiaozi, jiaozi with bean paste and jiaozi with mushrooms. Southern flavor, and a sweet and salty "double dumplings". These zongzi have different tastes, which makes the zongzi family colorful.

Due to the spread of food culture, as early as ancient times, the technology of making zongzi in China spread abroad, so many countries in the world also have the custom of eating zongzi.

Peruvians eat zongzi at Christmas. The family sat together, eating zongzi and celebrating Christmas. Even some married daughters will go back to their parents' homes on this day and taste the zongzi made by their mothers.

Burmese also like to eat zongzi. On the Dragon Boat Festival, they use glutinous rice as the main raw material and cooked bananas and coconuts as fillings. This kind of zongzi is very attractive, soft, sweet and unique.

The Dragon Boat Festival in Japan is on the fifth day of May in the solar calendar. The main ingredient of their jiaozi is rice flour, which looks like a bell.

The jiaozi wrapped by Malaysians is very similar in shape to that in Guangdong, China, and is characterized by its relatively large size. Besides fresh meat jiaozi and ham jiaozi, there are also bean paste and coconut jiaozi, which are very delicious.

The dumplings in the Philippines are long and taste the same as those in eastern Zhejiang. Zongzi is also a necessary food for Filipinos to celebrate Christmas.