The New Year's dinner in my hometown may be different from many places. In most places, the iconic meal is on Chinese New Year's Eve, while in my hometown it is early in the morning, and some even at 3 o'clock in the morning.
I remember when I was a child for the Chinese New Year, I was still asleep, and my parents woke me up and said that it was time to have breakfast and New Year's dinner. At that time, when our family was having a New Year's dinner, it was pitch black outside, and we saw the light of the artillery battle flashing in the dark night, which was the sign and signal that each family was eating the New Year's dinner one after another. Our family is no exception, my father took a roll of cannons and lit it on the pedestal, crackled **, and then officially ate the New Year's dinner.
Why do you eat your New Year's dinner so early?I didn't know why until I was older. I heard parents say that when the New Year is over, we should avoid others from colliding with each other, and if we collide, we will step on the New Year's soup (root). This "soup" is homophonic with "root", and "root" is the root of the crop. In our village, there are usually some farmers, so they are very worried that others will trample on the roots of the crops, so everyone rushes to eat the New Year's meal before dawn.
In addition, there is a custom of eating New Year's dinner first, whoever eats New Year's dinner first, then it means that everything in the year will be first. Because of this concept, the New Year's dinner every year is often the same as a race, to see who is in the forefront, every household unconsciously participates in it, the more they grab, the more they rush forward, and even some people cook the New Year's dinner at 0:00 on the same day, and then eat the New Year's dinner, and then go to sleep. There are still many people who still follow the custom of eating New Year's dinner before dawn, but it is not so common anymore.