Fragrant February 2nd
Text/Li Jianmin
(Web Photo)
The big red Spring Festival at the door of every household is still as bright as new, the lanterns of the Lantern Festival are still dazzling in the treetops on the street, people from all walks of life have begun their intense and orderly work and study step by step, and the "year" seems to be like a selfless happy angel to bring us happiness and reunion, and then quietly withdraw.
The sun rises in the east, the spring breeze sends warmth, riding on the increasingly harmonious spring breeze, stepping on the passionate beat of the Winter Olympics, we are about to start a new journey, entering the lunar february when everything sprouts and spring is getting stronger.
"On the second of February, the dragon looked up, and everyone made small households plough cattle." The second day of the second month of the lunar calendar, also known as the Farming Festival and the Green Dragon Festival, has symbolized the beginning of farming since ancient times. Legend has it that one of the Three Emperors, Fu Xi, the ancestor of the Chinese nation, personally went down to the field to do farm work on this day of the year, and his wife went to the field to bring him food, and later Yao Shun and others actively followed suit and went to the land to farm, and when king Wu of Zhou came, he took this as a national policy to implement. Since ancient times, people have regarded February 2 as the beginning of spring ploughing, on this day the ancients shaved their dragon heads, sacrificed shrine gods, and raised dragon boats... Pray for the wind and rain to be smooth, and to be blessed.
When I was a child, the second of February in my hometown was very grand, and every family celebrated and the fragrance wafted from household to household! Stir-fried bean grains, fried peanuts, making noodle beans, lighting radish lamps, hoarding grains... It's hilarious and unique!
The night before february 2, the mother selected the best soybeans to soak in advance, put peppercorns, large ingredients, fragrant leaves, salt into the water, the soaked soybeans were bulging, fat mounds, and the mother used a fence to fish out the soybeans and dry them. We will go to the sandy soil in the east of the village and use the finest sieve to sift out some fine sand, and the preparation work will be completed. Every time at this time, I rushed to burn the fire, my mother poured fine sand into the pot, the flames licked the bottom of the pot, and my mother waved the shovel in her hand to stir-fry the sand in the pot, and I had to fry the sand dry and blanched to make the soaked soybeans under the pot. In that era of poor material life, children rarely had snacks, and the fried goods on February 2 were simply more delicious than Chinese New Year's Eve rice, and the sound of "prickly, prickly" was extremely pleasant. The soybeans crackled and sang in the hot sand, happily doing slimming exercises, I was in the steaming fog, smelling the smell of beans with the smell of sand, I couldn't help but salivate, and couldn't wait to ask again and again: "Mom, are the beans ripe?" "My mother would fish out a few from the pot for me to taste, although the hot tongue hurt, although the beans still smelled of raw beans, but the fresh fragrance still slid from the tip of the tongue to the bottom of the heart, beautiful!"
As the crackling sound gradually decreases, it slowly disappears, and the soybeans come out of the pot! Round and round, the grains were piping hot, and the fragrance was wafting, and they were basking their bellies in the basket, letting the fragrance flood the courtyard, and the air was filled with a thick bean fragrance. The scent is so contagious that it won't be long before the neighbor's little hungry cats feast together! February 2 not only fried soybeans, but also fried peanuts, fried noodle beans (add sugar and noodles, rolled into strips, and then cut into small cubes or balls), such gourmet families have to stay and eat for a long time.
"On February 2, fry the beans." There is also a beautiful legend too! Legend has it that in ancient times, an emperor forgot to sacrifice on the second of February, angering the Jade Emperor, who ordered a drought of three years as punishment. Because the rain did not fall, the riverbed dried up, the bookmakers withered, the people could not drink water, could not eat, displaced, and suffered unspeakable. The Dragon King's youngest son, Qinglong, saw the pain in his eyes and felt pain in his heart, and secretly rained a rainy rain, and in an instant, everything recovered, and the human world was lush. When the Jade Emperor learned of this, he was furious and ordered the Green Dragon to be crushed under a large mountain, unless it wanted to return to the Heavenly Court unless the golden beans blossomed. When the people learned of this news, they were impatient, and everyone brainstormed and finally came up with a good way, every household fried soybeans and corn, soybeans and corn burst out like golden beans blossoming, and everyone put fried soybeans and corn on the yard case. The Jade Emperor was deeply moved to see the golden soybeans and corn blossoming like golden beans, and released the green dragon, which shook its head and tail, and flew to the heavenly court with its head held high, and from then on the wind and rain were smooth, and the country was safe. The custom of frying beans on the second of February has also been inherited.
On the second day of February, in addition to frying soybeans, every household has a big project - grain hoarding, the so-called grain hoard is to use grass and wood ash in the yard to sprinkle into the shape of a granary, the yard is how big it is, the shape of the hoard is diverse, square, round, all wear a tapered hoarding hat, after the painting is finished, in the corner of the hoarding sprinkled with corn, soybeans, sorghum, wheat and other crops, meaning the new year's grain harvest, full of hoards.
In addition to enjoying the food on this day, there is also a fun homework in the evening - lighting the radish lamp. The clever mother picked a large white radish (some with cabbage root), cut a small section of the bottom of the thick radish head, dug a hole in the middle, poured cooking oil into it, rubbed a tampon with cotton as a wick, and then lit it. With the passage of time, the oil is getting less and less, the wick is getting shorter and shorter, and finally it is slowly extinguished, this is the time when everyone is most curious, the whole family is clustered around the radish lamp, several pairs of eyes are carefully staring and searching, to see what will be knotted on their own wick, what they will hear about, what will be harvested that year. There were indeed many crops on the black wick: some like peanuts, some like soybeans, some like corn...
"On the second of February, the dragon looked up." The fragrant February 2nd is an important part of the excellent traditional culture of the motherland, and it also brings a lot of happiness and hope to our childhood.
【About the Author】Li Jianmin is a Chinese teacher at Yingcai Primary School in Dongchangfu District, Liaocheng City, Shandong Province. Committed to primary school Chinese situation teaching, to create a lively and interesting Chinese classroom. He has won many awards in the two-level competition class in the urban area. My ideal is to be a dreamer on the road of curiosity, with a group of dolls to read, write, and learn Chinese.