Wednesday, September 14, 2011

What's That? Wednesday 9/14/2011

Today's What's That? Wednesday is (insert drum roll)...

             the Moon Cake!

The first two Moon Cakes we tried, chocolate and
bean paste.

This past Monday was the Mid-Autumn Festival, a celebration of the eighth month of the Chinese Lunar calendar.  The moon is supposed to be a full moon during this time  It is also called the Moon Festival because of the fables surrounding the holiday.  Traditionally the Chinese will gather with family during the festival and they might present offerings and share a Moon Cake.  The cake is cut so that each family member will get a piece.

I have decided that the Moon Cakes must be the Chinese family's version of fruit cake...no one really likes to eat one, but the holiday isn't complete until it's arrived.  There are many varieties of Moon Cakes, some with meat, fruit, bean paste, chocolate and some with a hard-boiled egg yolk in the middle (to symbolize the full moon).  No one really seems to like them; the Chinese think they are too sweet and the Westerner's don't appreciate the flavors either.  But, you still see entire displays of Moon Cakes at shops all over the city and people continue to exchange them out of duty!

Jamie had the day off of work and the girls were home from school, so we were able to have a nice relaxing day.  We're still trying to unpack all of the boxes from our sea shipment and it was great having time to work on that.

LBean, a friend and EBean getting ready to sample the Moon Cakes.

EBean wins the prize for the most Moon Cakes eaten!

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