Why does Qingming want cold food and eat cold food? ?

In fact, at first, Tomb-Sweeping Day and cold food were two different things. Tomb-Sweeping Day is a festival dedicated to sweeping graves, offering sacrifices and worshipping ancestors. The Cold Food Festival is a day or two before Tomb-Sweeping Day, which was set up to commemorate meson tui. On this day, every household can't make a fire to cook.

Because at that time, as a courtier of Zhong Er, the son of the State of Jin, Jiezitui cut off the meat on his leg and gave it to Zhong Er when he was exiled to Zhong Er. Originally, after Zhong Er became a monarch, he should repay meson tui. However, Zhong Er forgot meson's kindness. In the bathroom, meson tui's heart was dark and cold, and he took his old mother to live in seclusion in Mianshan.

One day, Zhong Er finally remembered the kindness of meson to feed himself, and decided to invite meson to push him out of the mountain. However, meson Tui is unwilling to help Zhong Er. Bathroom, Zhong Er sent someone to release Yamakaji to force him to leave the mountain. Unexpectedly, in the end, meson push did not come out of the mountain, but died in the fire with his old mother.

Zhong Er changed Mianshan to Jieshan to commemorate meson push. He also ordered that every year after the death of meson tui, no fire should be made and cold meals should be eaten to commemorate him.

This is an accepted statement, of course, there are other statements. For example, one of them thinks that the Cold Food Festival is due to the fire ban system in the Zhou Dynasty. There are many legends about eating cold food, so I won't list them one by one.

Later, in the Tang Dynasty, people combined the Cold Food Festival with Tomb-Sweeping Day, not only eating cold food, but also going to sweep graves and worship ancestors.

What does cold food mean? Chinese medicine tells you.

Cold food generally refers to cold food that can be eaten without making a fire. In the past, people would make some cakes to worship their ancestors and eat them after the sacrifice. Later, slowly with the different regions, all localities formed their own customs.

Just like Jiangnan area, it is common for Tomb-Sweeping Day to eat green meatballs. The main thing is to knead the juice of wormwood with glutinous rice and steam it in a pot. Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica in the Ming Dynasty recorded: "Artemisia argyi is a perennial seedling, which grows in February, with straight and white stems and is four or five feet high. Accepting moxibustion is very effective. As a medicine, Folium Artemisiae Argyi is warm and pure yang, and has the functions of restoring yang, regulating qi and blood, eliminating dampness and dispelling cold, stopping bleeding and preventing miscarriage. So it is also called a grass doctor. " In addition, wormwood is also regarded as a symbol of "exorcism". Therefore, the Youth League is very popular in Jiangnan area.

But the main ingredient of the youth league is glutinous rice, which tastes bad after it is cold. And glutinous rice is difficult to digest. For people with bad stomach, eating cold green balls is not conducive to digestion and absorption, and it is harmful to the stomach.

In addition, many people now add meat when making dumplings. In fact, this practice will increase the burden on the stomach and is not conducive to digestion.

Earlier, Jin Wengong set up a cold food festival to commemorate Jiexiu. At that time, there was a custom of banning fire and cold food only at the Cold Food Festival. Later, because the time of the Cold Food Festival and Tomb-Sweeping Day was very close, it gradually merged into a festival, so there was a tradition of eating cold food in Tomb-Sweeping Day.

Architectural landscape

Tomb-Sweeping Day's custom also includes offering sacrifices to ancestors for outing.

There are many traditional customs in Tomb-Sweeping Day, among which ancestor worship is extremely important. On this festival, people will worship their deceased ancestors, burn paper money and repair graves. Some people will go for an outing in the suburbs in Tomb-Sweeping Day to enjoy the beautiful scenery of the revival of everything in spring.

The so-called "Qingming" means that nature is clean and bright, and it is also a beautiful realm that people have been pursuing since ancient times. Therefore, there are many activities in Qingming, such as ancestor worship, outing, outing and so on, to enjoy the clean and beautiful atmosphere of spring. As the saying goes, "Food is the most important thing for the people". For such a big festival, eating is essential. Therefore, Tomb-Sweeping Day eats "cold food", and people are grateful for the gift of spring while tasting it.

The first kind of "cold food": jiaozi.

Don't underestimate this little guy jiaozi. No festival can be separated from him, and Tomb-Sweeping Day is no exception. Spring is the season when all kinds of wild vegetables are on the market. Tomb-Sweeping Day will be clear-headed, so he will eat. Then come to jiaozi, a kind of wild vegetable, which can not only express the feelings for ancestors, but also imply that the family is round and round, with many children and grandchildren.

The second kind of "cold food": eggs

According to "Zhou Li", "Muduo was forbidden to follow the fire in high school in the early spring", so people put out cooking, which means that Tomb-Sweeping Day banned fire, and boiled eggs were the best food to spend the fire-forbidden period. So before Tomb-Sweeping Day, eggs were cooked with wormwood, brown sugar and jujube, so the cooked eggs were bright and fragrant. In addition, wormwood also has the function of expelling cold. Female friends eat eggs cooked by wormwood, which can drive away the cold and avoid dysmenorrhea. Therefore, people eat eggs in Tomb-Sweeping Day, which means they are healthy all year round.

The third kind of "cold food": steamed noodles and pharynx

Steamed noodle swallow is our custom in Jiaodong, which is also called "Bobo Chicken". Generally, before Tomb-Sweeping Day, the old people at home would knead noodles into the shape of birds or swallows and steam them in a steamer. After steaming, they will draw beautiful patterns on the body of the noodle swallow, and put bright eyes on it, and the noodle swallow will be ready. Steaming noodles and swallows means welcoming a beautiful spring, and the next days will be happy, healthy and lucky.

The fourth kind of "cold food": Youth League

Youth League is a delicious food in the south, but it is also very popular in the north now. Youth League is also called wormwood Baba or wormwood cake. As the name implies, it is a cake made of wormwood powder. Blanch fresh wormwood and beat it into juice. Add sugar to glutinous rice flour, and then make dough with wormwood juice. In order to balance the nutrition, increase the taste and make the green ball bright and crystal clear, it needs to be heated to make it well. The Youth League, just like its name, means that the new year is round, happy and healthy.