The origin of eating moon cakes in Mid-Autumn Festival

Legend has it that Tang Gaozu Tang Gaozu celebrated the Mid-Autumn Festival with civil and military officials. He looked at the round "Hu cake" sent by Tubo with great interest, pointed to the bright moon in the sky and invited it with round cakes. Later, the custom of eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival spread.

At first, moon cakes were not called moon cakes, but Hu cakes, which were made of walnuts and sesame seeds. When Emperor Taizong was eating Hu Bing, he thought the name Hu Bing was not pleasant to listen to, and it happened to be the Mid-Autumn Festival on August 15th, so he looked up at the moon and said that since the moon was so round, he called this Hu Bing a moon cake.

At first, moon cakes were sacrifices to the moon. Later, people gradually combined the Mid-Autumn Festival with enjoying the moon and tasting moon cakes, giving and eating moon cakes, symbolizing the reunion between man and the moon.