Jiaxing has been known as the hometown of fish and rice and the house of silk since ancient times, which has bred a long history of "rice culture" and also created a colorful Jiangnan folk art. Nowadays, the vivid Jiangnan folk carving, Jiaxing Sugar Cake Board, has become a hard "business card" of Jiaxing's colorful folk culture. It has been more than 130 years.
The sugar cake board is an impression for making flower cakes. The carving style of the cake mold is simple, the technique is concise, the layout is reasonable, and it is shaped by gods. The cake mold pattern is varied, and the common ones are shou peach, yuanbao, pisces, ruyi, sanji, eight immortals, etc., full of happiness and auspicious flavor. In the countryside of Jiaxing City, the traditional custom of making sugar cakes in moderation every New Year has been followed to this day.
Due to the different customs and beliefs of different places, their shapes, fancy styles, etc. are different. According to the type: there are Shou Peach, Yuanbao, Panlong, Pisces, Ruyi, Eight Immortals, Three Animals, etc.; according to the content: there are animals, flowers, auspicious and other patterns, as well as "Shou", "Fu", "Four Seasons of Peace", "Golden Ten Thousand" and other inscriptions. Cakes with various patterns printed on the cake board are one for the purpose of worshiping the gods and warding off evil spirits; the other is to imply auspiciousness.
The sugar cake board is an impression of making flower cakes, and the flower cakes with various patterns are printed with rice flour and brown sugar, which are steamed and eaten, and are called "sugar cakes" by locals. Sugar cake board is the product of national folk customs, sugar cake board has a handle or no handle, most of the sugar cake board is carved with oil wood, rosewood, poplar wood and so on. The shape of the sugar cake board varies from single "eye" with a handle to a "double eye" and "three eyes" without a handle, and the carved figures are as large as 18 cm in diameter and as small as 4 cm. It is difficult to find some characteristics of folk paper-cutting and the bas-carving knife method, and its carving style is fine carving and fine carving.
Making sugar cakes is a very grand thing. From ancient times to the present, in the countryside of Jiaxing, activities or ceremonies such as festivals, weddings, and shangliang are all stamped with sugar cake boards. Sugar cake is a traditional snack made of flour, white sugar and brown sugar, which is sticky, soft and sweet. First, add glutinous rice flour and an appropriate amount of japonica rice flour to knead carefully, add sugar or brown sugar, and mix evenly with warm boiling water into pieces and knead into a ball. Don't underestimate this process is simple, but meticulous work, kung fu work. Water, sugar, and powder should be added just right, the powder should not be too rotten or too hard, and it should be kneaded evenly. It usually takes more than half an hour to knead a powder dough. Simple old people often have to rub back pain. The kneaded dough is then pressed into a sugar cake board to form, and the formed raw cake is evenly placed in the steamer basket for steaming, and after steaming, it can be eaten!
Every household uses sugar cake, combined with the different requirements of the season, and expresses its function in the form of printed cake. Manlong cake and three animal cakes are specially used for ancestor worship, Yuanbao cake and Fushou cake are used to worship the god of Vesta, and Ruyi cake is stamped according to the population of the family, and each person eats one to indicate that everything is good in the coming year. To celebrate the full moon of children, the average person is made of four steamer sugar cakes by their grandmothers, and when they come to the door, they put dragon cakes in the middle of each steaming, and there are Fulu Shouxi cakes around them, named "Dragon and Phoenix Chengxiang", to show celebration. When the younger generations make shou for the elders, they make "shou cakes" and "shou peaches". In addition to the above uses, sugar cakes are used in seasonal seasons such as Qingming, July and a half, winter solstice, Dragon Boat Festival, and Chongyang Festival.
Jiaxing sugar cake board is a folk belief and custom as a spiritual activity, contained in folk art, creating some folk art with strong folk beliefs. The carved template is simple and elegant, unique ingenuity, has strong local characteristics and style, is the product of national folk customs, and is one of the most representative of many folk handicrafts in the land of fish and rice. It realizes people's inner will through folk art means, implying people's expectations for a better life!