How to Make Lanzhou Rice Cake

Lanzhou people have a long custom of eating rice cakes on New Year's Day. In the past, when materials were scarce, the rice cakes eaten by Lanzhou people on New Year's Day were often made of yellow sticky rice; nowadays, most of the Lanzhou people eat rice cakes made of river rice.

Nian Gao has three colors, red, yellow and white, symbolizing gold and silver, and the old Lanzhou used to call it "Nian Nian Gao", which is the same as "Nian Nian Gao", implying that people's work and life improve year by year. Therefore, a former poet said that the rice cake: "rice cake symbolizes a little deep clouds, white as silver and yellow gold. The year expects to be high when the time is favorable, pious and silent wishing for wealth coming."

It is said that Lanzhou people have had the habit of eating rice cakes since the Ming Dynasty, and they have slowly evolved from a treat for people celebrating a good grain harvest to a food for good luck on New Year's Day.

The old Lanzhou New Year's Eve rice cakes are mainly steamed and fried in two ways, all sweet; while the southerners living in Lanzhou New Year's Eve rice cakes in addition to steaming and deep-frying, there are also slices of fried and boiled in soup, the taste of sweet and salty both.

Old Lanzhou rice cakes are also used to offer sacrifices to the gods and ancestors during the Spring Festival. Therefore, the rice cakes in Lanzhou are not only the food of Spring Festival, but also the hope for the coming year.