Spring cake (also known as spring bud cake): In early spring, spring buds (wild vegetables, also known as cotton buds and water buds) are everywhere, green and tender. When the woman takes it home, she washes it with clear water, grinds it, mixes it with glutinous rice flour (appropriate amount of salt or sugar can be added) to make cakes, and then fries it in a pot. This kind of cake is soft and fragrant, with endless aftertaste, especially with the wonderful effect of clearing the intestines and relieving boredom, so in this season, almost every household in the ancient village is beating gongs and drums, and the rice cakes are fragrant. There is also a saying in the ancient book "At the Age of Guangji": "On the day of beginning of spring, we eat reeds and spring cakes ..." It can be seen that eating spring cakes is indeed a traditional custom.
Qingming Cake: Before and after Tomb-Sweeping Day, glutinous rice flour was mixed with chicory leaves or hemp leaves and mustard leaves. The taste of this kind of cake is similar to that of spring bud cake, but it has the smell of vegetables, and it also has the functions of relieving boredom and nourishing the stomach. At the same time, it is also an offering to worship ancestors and gods.
Grain Bud Cake: In order to prevent late spring seedlings from freezing, farmers often soak seeds according to the amount of seedlings that exceeds the actual needs during the Qingming period to prepare for replanting rice seeds. So there will be more buds when sowing. In order not to waste food, the villagers softened rice buds and glutinous rice flour and fried them into cakes. This kind of cake is sweet, without sugar, suitable for all ages, especially children.
Shangliang Cake: In order to pray for the blessings of ancestors and gods and celebrate the auspicious day of Shangliang, people who build new houses make cakes with half glutinous rice flour and half japonica rice flour, cover them with a red dot, and then steam them in retort or pot. This kind of cake tastes light, but it tastes smooth, tough and refreshing, and has a smell of rice.
Delivery cake: This is a cake made by the woman's family one month before giving birth. It is also steamed with glutinous rice flour and japonica rice flour. People who are concerned are formed by printing and pressing. There are patterns of lotus leaves, lotus flowers and lotus buds on the rice cake, and there are words such as "early birth of your son" or "a hundred children and a thousand grandchildren".
Three Dynasties cake: it is a cake made by the father-in-law, mother-in-law or father on the third day after the child is born. The materials and methods are the same as those used for making cakes. Elegant people also use printing to shape, but the patterns are mostly flowers, and the words are "long life" or "long life and wealth".
People in ancient villages like to make and eat rice cakes, treat them as food, and treat them as small gifts for each other between relatives and neighbors, so that when they taste rice cakes, they can exchange good luck and learn skills, thus enhancing family ties and friendship. This is a folk custom worthy of recognition and praise for some people who are not tired of eating meat and drinking but despise family friendship today.