In the Mid-Autumn Festival of previous years, many times I could only look at the moon in a foreign land, miss the Mid-Autumn Festival when I was a child, and also miss the bean paste mooncake in my hometown of Jiangmen Muzhou.
Sometimes thinking about it, the sweet smell of the hometown bean paste mooncake involuntarily rises from the bottom of the heart, gradually rising to the nasal cavity, until even the corners of the mouth and lips can't help but flood with that sweetness.
On the eve of this year's Mid-Autumn Festival, my mother found bean paste mooncakes from my hometown of Muzhou for me. Although these mooncakes are still the appearance of the memory, a bite of the mooncakes, the bean paste is still the feeling of melting in the mouth, the sweetness in the memory is still the same, but how can not eat the mouth full of osmanthus fragrance when childhood.
On the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival on August 15, although the night in Guangdong had begun to cool down at this time, when the moon had just appeared, facing the autumn wind and night dew, our family had already begun to prepare for the Mid-Autumn Festival in the open space in front of the door.
At that time, we lived with our grandparents, and the uncles were not yet married, and the aunts were not married, so we huddled together to prepare for the moon viewing.
We hung red lanterns on the osmanthus tree in front of the door; uncles would put candles on our lanterns, one by one; aunts would set up tables and chairs in the open space, fathers and mothers would carry fried snails, cooked taro, mooncakes, and grapefruit; grandpa and grandma would sit and watch us laugh.
Therefore, under the moonlight of the clear and lustrous land, the autumn wind sends the sweet aroma of osmanthus flowers into the nose of the person, bringing people a burst of pleasure. Before they began to appreciate the moon, everyone involuntarily sucked their noses and boasted: "True fragrance!"
Smell the osmanthus flowers and look at the big, round moon. Grandpa would sometimes point to the mottled shadow on the moon and tell us the story of Chang'e running to the moon, saying that as long as we looked carefully, we could see Chang'e holding a small jade rabbit and leaning next to the osmanthus tree. We children don't care so much, just laughing with our uncles and aunts while chasing and scolding, while grabbing mooncakes to eat.
At that time, the only thing that could be eaten was cheap bean paste mooncakes, a few round cakes were simply wrapped in oil paper, and the oil of the mooncake oozed out of the oil paper, and the oil paper became translucent.
That bean paste stuffing, are fried with lard, the entrance is delicate and lubricated, the bean paste fluffy will not harden into a ball, as soon as it is imported, it can be immediately melted in the mouth. The taste of the bean paste after melting in the mouth is so sweet!
Today's children say that our bean paste mooncakes at that time were sweet, greasy and oily, but for us, everything was just the right feeling.
Because you eat a mooncake under an osmanthus tree, the sweetness of the mooncake will also intertwine with the aroma of osmanthus flowers. Take a bite, the mouth is full of osmanthus fragrance, and the sweetness of the mooncake is thus more fully set off by the aroma of osmanthus flowers.
Grandpa would always laugh and watch us eat until we licked the crust in our hands clean, and then handed us a cup of black tea, saying that we would not feel tired after drinking tea. In fact, even if we don't drink black tea, we can still eat another bean paste mooncake.
Inside and outside the house, the aroma was overwhelming, and the laughter kept overflowing the doors and windows. The family dispelled the cold of autumn with laughter, and the sporadic sound of firecrackers or came from time to time added to the joy of the festival. We ate and ate and played until we were tired and didn't know when we would fall asleep.
Such a night is so beautiful, this is the Happy and Sweet Mid-Autumn Festival that I remember.
Today, the grandparents are long gone, and the uncles and aunts are full of children and grandchildren. But the sweet taste of the bean paste mooncake, accompanied by the moonlight and the faint fragrance of osmanthus flowers, can only survive in my memory.