Heavy Snow: Everything is closed into midwinter (decoding the twenty-four solar terms)
The years are silent, and the solar terms rotate.
After the light snow, it will usher in heavy snow on the 15th.
The name of the solar terms, bluntly speaking of climate change, "The Collection of Seventy-two Hours of the Moon Order" says: "Heavy snow, November Festival. The big one is full, and the snow is full at this point." The snow is heavy on the branches and the snow on the road. It happened from time to time, as Bai Juyi wrote in "Night Snow": "I was surprised that the bed was cold and the window was bright again. I knew the snow was heavy in the middle of the night, and I heard the sound of folding bamboo." Zhou Mi of the Southern Song Dynasty described Lin'an in "Old Stories of Wulin" ( The scene of princes and nobles playing in the snow in the city of Hangzhou, Zhejiang today, "Snow lions of all sizes are entered in the back garden, and decorated with golden bells and threads, and made snowflakes, snow lanterns, snow mountains and the like", and gold basins are used to hold snow sculptures It's not interesting to bring all kinds of things indoors to enjoy.
There is a proverb in the north that goes "heavy snow and light snow, cooking without rest".
After the heavy snow, it will enter midwinter, and all things will be closed. The ancients used the midwinter moon as the "smooth moon", and "smooth" means full.
"Book of Rites Yueling" records that the emperor of Zhou ordered a secretary to say: "Don't do earthworks, be careful not to build houses, and don't build houses and the public, so as to secure them and close them." Anything related to land must not be done; Covered places and houses and palaces are not allowed to lift the top cover, and it is not allowed to mobilize people to stabilize Yang Qi.
The ancient people's view of "closed Tibet" gradually developed into the custom of "cat winter" among the people.
There is a saying in the villages in Shandong that "Luke is at the top of the door and only drinks red sticky porridge".
Luke is a heavy stone farm tool, often used to grind rice, grind noodles or level the land.
In the winter, the north wind in the countryside is biting, people use a wooden bed to cover the door, and cats drink warm red sticky porridge on the kang to keep out the cold.
Red sticky porridge is millet and sweet potato porridge. Millet nourishes yin and blood, warms the stomach and sleeps peacefully, and sweet potato is sweet and flat, and invigorates the spleen and stomach.
Jiangnan area pays attention to "light snow pickled vegetables, heavy snow pickled meat".
Before and after heavy snowfall, the temperature drops sharply, which is a good time to marinate all kinds of meat.
On the day when the sun comes out, under the eaves of the rising sun, you can see pickled goods drying in the sun in every household.
There are two kinds of marinating, one is salted, called "salt goods", such as cured chicken, bacon, etc.; .
The "leader" among them is the sauced duck. There is a saying in Hangzhou that "no duck without sauce is not a new year".
In the Qing Dynasty, Hangzhou Sauce Duck was quite famous.
Hong Rusong of the Qing Dynasty supplemented the "Hangzhou Customs Legacy" records, "The sauced duck is the best, and the one made by the Shao Hotel in Hangzhou is the best." There are hundreds of homemade sauced ducks in various restaurants, and they are sold out as soon as the winter solstice is over. City residents, there are many foreigners to buy.
People regard the sauced duck as a good gift, and the folk saying goes, "You have the northwest wind, and I have the old wine sauced duck as a gift."
When it comes to the way to eat sauced duck, the most authentic way is to steam it.
Lu Xun wrote in his reply to his mother in 1935: "A small packet, I received it today. The sauced duck and sauced meat are slightly white. After steaming, the taste is still not bad..." The steamed sauced duck is fragrant and delicious. It is a winter day. An excellent appetizer here.
The custom of eating meat to keep out the cold can be found everywhere. In the Baotou area of Inner Mongolia, there is a folk proverb of "killing pigs in light snow and slaughtering sheep in heavy snow". During the heavy snow season, eating mutton replenishes vitality and increases the ability to resist the cold.
When slaughtering pigs and sheep, relatives, friends and neighbors came to help.
The owner uses sauerkraut, vermicelli, sand potatoes, etc. to stew a pot of stewed vegetables, which is called "National Unity Rice". Neighbors are invited to have a meal together, implying unity and harmony and a prosperous life.
In many areas in the north, Daxue has the custom of eating caramel.
Vendors selling caramel are walking around the streets and alleys with gongs in their hands. When the gongs in their hands sound, children flock to them, looking forward to having a bite of sweet caramel.
In the middle of winter, the sky is cold and the sky is freezing. "The accumulation of overcast snow turns into heavy snow, and it is scattered everywhere" (Yuan Zhen's "Ode to the Twenty-Four Qi Poems: The November Festival of Heavy Snow").
But this time is also the beginning of the germination of Yang Qi, and everything is gaining momentum, accumulating energy for the blooming of spring.
(The author of Yuan Jin is an associate professor of Hangzhou Normal University) (Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition)