Where does China have the habit of drinking Laba porridge?

Laba porridge is made of various ingredients in Laba Festival, [1] also known as Qibao Wuwei porridge. The custom of Laba porridge no longer belongs to Buddhists. Laba porridge, as a folk custom, is eaten on December 8 of the lunar calendar to celebrate the harvest, and has been passed down to this day. The earliest Laba porridge was boiled with adzuki beans, which gradually enriched through evolution and local characteristics. The legend of Laba porridge comes from Tianzhu, India. The eighth day of the twelfth lunar month is the anniversary of Buddha's enlightenment, commonly known as Laba Festival, which is called Magic Weapon Festival in Buddhism.

Up to now, people in the south, northeast and northwest of China still keep the custom of eating Laba porridge, which is rare in Guangdong. With different materials, glutinous rice, red beans, jujube, chestnuts, peanuts, ginkgo, lotus seeds, lilies and so on are commonly used to cook sweet porridge. Longan, longan and candied fruit are all ripe. Eating a steaming bowl of Laba porridge in winter is delicious and nutritious, which can really increase happiness and prolong life.

Tianjin: People in Tianjin cook Laba porridge, which is similar to that in Beijing. There are lotus seeds, lilies, pearl rice, coix seed, coix seed, glutinous rice, sticky yellow rice, kidney beans, mung beans, longan pulp, longan pulp, ginkgo, red dates and sweet-scented osmanthus in syrup. They are all good in color, smell and taste. In recent years, black rice has been added. The Laba porridge can be used for dietotherapy, and has the effects of invigorating spleen, stimulating appetite, invigorating qi, calming nerves, clearing away heart fire and nourishing blood.

Shanxi: Laba porridge in Shanxi, also called Babao porridge, is mainly millet, with cowpea, adzuki bean, mung bean and jujube, and sticky yellow rice, rice and glutinous rice. In southeastern Shanxi, cooking porridge with water is also one of the eating customs. This kind of porridge is called fragrant rice, which means adzuki beans, red beans, cowpeas, sweet potatoes, peanuts, glutinous rice and persimmons on the fifth day of the twelfth lunar month.

Northern Shaanxi Plateau: On the day of Laba, in addition to rice and beans, porridge also contains various dried fruits, tofu and meat. Usually cooked in the morning, sweet and salty, depending on people's tastes. If it is lunch, we should cook some noodles in porridge and have a reunion dinner. After eating, you should put porridge on the door, on the stove and on the trees outside the door to ward off evil spirits and avoid disasters, so as to welcome the next year's agricultural harvest. According to folklore, Laba avoids eating vegetables on this day, saying that eating vegetables will lead to a lot of weeds in crops. Laba people in southern Shaanxi want to eat mixed porridge, which is divided into "five flavors" and "eight flavors" The former is cooked with rice, glutinous rice, peanuts, ginkgo and beans. The latter uses the above five raw materials to add diced meat, tofu, radish and seasonings. On Laba Festival, people not only eat Laba porridge, but also worship their ancestors and granaries with porridge.

Gansu: Gansu people traditionally cook Laba porridge with grains and vegetables. After cooking, it is not only eaten by family members, but also distributed to neighbors to feed livestock. In Lanzhou and Baiyin urban areas, Laba porridge is made of rice, beans, red dates, ginkgo, lotus seeds, raisins, dried apricots, dried wax gourd, walnuts, shredded mung beans, sugar and diced meat. After cooking, it is first used to worship the door god, the kitchen god, the land god and the god of wealth, and pray for good weather and good harvests in the coming year; Then give it to the neighbors and give it to the last family. Wuwei, Gansu pays attention to "Sulaba", eating coarse rice, lentil rice or coarse rice, cooked with fried seeds and twist. Folk call it "bean porridge bubble".

Ningxia: People in Ningxia usually use lentils, soybeans, red beans, broad beans, black beans, rice and potatoes to cook porridge as laba rice, and then add wheat flour or buckwheat flour to cut into rhombic willow leaves, or make it into small round eggs, and then add chopped green onion oil to eat before cooking porridge. On this day, the whole family only eats laba rice, not vegetables.

Qinghai: Most people in Xining, Qinghai are Han people, but Laba doesn't eat porridge, but eats wheat kernel rice. Boil freshly ground wheat with beef and mutton, add green salt, ginger peel, pepper, tsaoko, Miao Xiang and other condiments, and after a night of slow fire, the meat and wheat merge into a milky white shape. Boil the pot in the morning, and the smell is fragrant.

Shandong: In the "Confucian food system" in Shandong, it is stipulated that "Laba porridge" is divided into two types. One is to cook rice with rice kernels, longan, lotus seeds, lilies, chestnuts, red dates and japonica rice, and add some "porridge fruits" to the bowl, mainly carved into various shapes of fruits for ornament. This kind of porridge is specially for Confucius' master and the master of the zodiac. The other is cooked with rice, sliced meat, cabbage and tofu. , is for the servants in Confucius.

Henan: People in Henan eat laba rice, which is made of eight kinds of raw materials, such as millet, mung bean, cowpea, wheat kernel, peanut, red dates and corn. When cooking, add some brown sugar and walnuts to make the porridge thick and fragrant, which means a bumper harvest in the coming year.

Jiangsu: Eating Laba porridge in Jiangsu is divided into sweet and salty, and the cooking methods are the same. It's just salty porridge with vegetables and salty steak. Suzhou people cook Laba porridge with arrowheads, water chestnuts, walnuts, pine nuts, euryales, red dates, chestnuts, fungus, vegetables, Flammulina velutipes and so on. Li Fu, a scholar in Suzhou in the Qing Dynasty, once wrote a poem: "The porridge on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month came from Brahma, and the seven treasures blended beautifully with mixed flavors."

Zhejiang people: Zhejiang people usually cook Laba porridge with walnut kernel, pine nuts, Euryale ferox, lotus seeds, red dates, longan meat and litchi meat. Sweet and fragrant, pray for a long life. It is said that this method of cooking porridge came from Nanjing, which contains some legends.

Sichuan: There are many people in Sichuan. Laba porridge is made in a variety of ways, including sweet, salty and spicy, while rural people eat salty food, mainly soybeans, peanuts, diced meat, white radish and carrots. Strangers come here to taste, although do as the Romans do, but it is difficult to get used to it. Nowadays, many people in the city eat sweet porridge, which can be called unique flavor. Laba is closely related to porridge. Drinking porridge in Laba is also a fancy and a level.