Minor Cold Customs

The Laba Festival is one of the most important festivals of the twelfth lunar month. It falls on the eighth day of the month, was called the “La Day” in ancient times, and is commonly known as the Laba Festival. Since the pre-Qin period, the day has been used to worship ancestors and deities and to pray for abundant harvests and good fortune. In addition to rites honoring ancestors and gods, people also carried out rituals to expel epidemics. This activity derived from ancient Nuo, a ritual for driving away ghosts and avoiding pestilence. One of the medical methods of prehistoric times was to expel spirits in order to treat disease. The twelfth-lunar-month custom of beating drums to drive away epidemics, a form of ritual magic, is still preserved today in Xinhua, Hunan, and some other regions.

The most deeply rooted custom of the Laba Festival is drinking Laba porridge. Traditionally, the porridge is made from eight kinds of newly harvested grain and fruit from that year and is generally sweet. Many farming households in the Central Plains, however, prefer savory Laba porridge. In addition to rice, millet, mung beans, cowpeas, peanuts, and red dates, they add radish, Chinese cabbage, starch noodles, kelp, tofu, and other ingredients. Laba porridge has a history of more than a thousand years in China and first became established during the Song dynasty. Every year on Laba Day, the imperial court, government offices, temples, and ordinary households all prepared Laba porridge. By the Qing dynasty, the custom had become even more widespread.

Traditional ingredients in Laba porridge include rice, millet, corn, coix seed, red dates, lotus seeds, peanuts, longan, and various beans such as red beans, mung beans, soybeans, black beans, and kidney beans, and the number of ingredients often exceeds eight. People believe that Laba porridge gathers the essence of the year’s grains and that eating it can bring abundant harvests and good health in the year ahead. On Laba Day, every household cooks a steaming pot of porridge. Temples in Beijing, Hangzhou, and elsewhere also distribute porridge, and worshippers eagerly go to receive a bowl of “Buddha porridge” and pray for good fortune in the new year.

In addition to drinking Laba porridge, the festival includes making Laba garlic in the north, brewing Laba wine, preparing Laba vinegar, and drying Laba tofu. Laba garlic is an important northern custom: peeled garlic cloves are placed in a sealable jar or bottle, vinegar is poured over them, and the container is sealed and kept in a cold place. Gradually, the garlic soaking in the vinegar turns green until the entire clove becomes jade-green, like emerald. When the jar is opened on New Year’s Eve, the garlic is crisp and green, while the vinegar is richly fragrant, sour, and pungent, making it an ideal accompaniment to dumplings. Its bright jade-green color is regarded as a symbol of good fortune.

The origins of the Laba Festival can be traced to the La sacrifices of the pre-Qin period, when people held sacrifices in the twelfth month at the end of the year to thank the many deities for their protection throughout the year. In the Han dynasty, the La sacrifice was fixed on the third Xu day after the Winter Solstice. During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the festival was moved to the eighth day of the twelfth month and merged with Buddhism’s Day of the Buddha’s Enlightenment, giving the Laba Festival both the traditional significance of sacrifice and the Buddhist significance of commemoration. According to legend, on the night of the eighth day of the twelfth month, the founder of Buddhism, Shakyamuni, regained his strength after receiving milk porridge from a herdswoman and finally attained enlightenment beneath the Bodhi tree. To commemorate the event, Buddhists held ceremonies on this day and cooked porridge from rice and fruit as an offering to the Buddha. As Buddhism spread, the custom gradually moved from monasteries into popular life.

On the Laba Festival, one can visit temples to receive or taste Laba porridge, including places such as Yonghe Temple in Beijing and Lingyin Temple in Hangzhou. It can also be made at home by washing and soaking rice, millet, red beans, mung beans, peanuts, lotus seeds, red dates, longan, and other ingredients before simmering them slowly. Northern households can also make Laba garlic by peeling garlic cloves, placing them in a glass jar, pouring in rice vinegar, sealing the container, and keeping it in a cool place; after several days, the garlic gradually turns green and can be eaten on New Year’s Eve.

During Minor Cold, the weather is cold and the body’s yang qi is stored within, making this an appropriate time for nourishment. The popular saying “三九补一冬，来年无病痛” — nourish the body through the coldest days of winter, and the coming year will be free of illness — reflects this idea. Minor Cold falls around the sanjiu period, so food-based nourishment is especially widespread. Each region has its own methods, but all revolve around one principle: warmth.

The custom of Minor Cold nourishment derives from the traditional Chinese medical theory of “winter storage.” Traditional Chinese medicine regards winter as the best season for nourishment, while the sanjiu period is the coldest part of the year; at this time, the body’s yang qi is hidden within, making it an appropriate moment to eat warming foods and replenish yang qi. Glutinous rice, mutton, chicken, and other warming ingredients can dispel cold, warm the body, and nourish qi and blood. Different regions formed their own traditions according to local produce: Nanjing vegetable rice combines glutinous rice with salted pork and sausage, while Guangdong glutinous-rice rice pairs sticky rice with cured meats, yet both follow the same dietary logic of warming and nourishing the body to resist the cold.

During Minor Cold, seasonal foods can be chosen according to local custom: people in Nanjing can prepare vegetable rice, people in Guangdong can make glutinous-rice rice, and northern households can stew mutton soup. One can also try different regional styles at home by combining glutinous rice, cured pork, sausage, peanuts, and other ingredients, or by cooking vegetable rice with greens, salted pork, and sausage to experience the traditional food nourishment of Minor Cold.

Drawing charts and counting the nines is an important tradition of Minor Cold carried over from the Winter Solstice. Minor Cold falls between the second and third “nines,” a key stage in the practice of counting the nines to dispel the cold. People use Nine-Nines Cold-Dispelling Charts to record the passage of time, adding one stroke or coloring one petal each day, cultivating inner calm through the long winter while waiting for spring.

The custom of counting the nines originated very early. According to tradition, it was already recorded in Zong Lin’s *Jingchu Suishiji* during the Liang dynasty of the Southern Dynasties. During the Daoguang reign of the Qing dynasty, the imperial phrase “亭前垂柳珍重待春风”, consisting of nine characters with nine strokes each, became the classic model for “writing the nines.” Scholars used the practice to cultivate calm, while ordinary people used it to count the days and look forward to spring.

During Minor Cold, one can continue filling in a Nine-Nines Cold-Dispelling Chart: in the plum-blossom version, color one petal each day; in the calligraphy version, trace one stroke daily. Continuing faithfully, one stroke at a time, allows one to witness spring drawing closer.

During Minor Cold, wintersweet is in full bloom and red plum blossoms are waiting to open, making this an ideal time to seek out and admire plum blossoms. The plum is one of the “Three Friends of Winter” in Chinese culture and is highly esteemed for its ability to withstand frost and snow. Minor Cold is one of the coldest periods of the year, yet plum blossoms open into the severe chill, becoming one of winter’s most moving sights. People leave their homes, visit plum groves, admire the flowers, seek out early blossoms, and compose verses about them, experiencing the spirit of the plum that does not fear the cold.

Meihuashan in Nanjing, Xiangxuehai in Suzhou, Chaoshan in Hangzhou, Wuxi Plum Garden, and the plum garden at Shanghai Grand View Garden are all renowned destinations. Nanjing’s Meihuashan is praised as “the foremost plum mountain under Heaven,” and its blossoms begin opening around Minor Cold, drawing crowds of visitors. For scholars and people of refined taste, seeking plum blossoms is more than viewing flowers; it is a form of spiritual cultivation. As the saying goes, “不经一番寒彻骨，怎得梅花扑鼻香。” — without enduring bitter cold to the bone, how could one ever encounter the plum blossom’s penetrating fragrance? The plum’s refusal to compete with other flowers for spring and its ability to bloom in the cold symbolize the perseverance admired in Chinese culture.

The custom of seeking and viewing plum blossoms has a long history. As early as the Wei and Jin periods, scholars already cultivated the fashion of admiring plum blossoms. The Southern Dynasties poet He Xun, while serving as an official in Yangzhou, had a plum tree before his official residence and often composed verse beneath it. By the Song dynasty, plum viewing had become especially popular. Fan Chengda wrote the *Plum Manual*, evaluating different varieties, while Lin Bu, who lived in seclusion on Solitary Hill by West Lake, planted plum trees and kept cranes and became famous for the phrase “plum wife and crane children.” Ming-dynasty scholar Wang Xiangjin recorded plum varieties and the seasons for viewing them in detail in the *Qunfang Pu*. By the Qing dynasty, seeking plum blossoms had become a winter gathering among Jiangnan scholars. From solitary appreciation by Tang and Song literati to shared enjoyment among ordinary people in the Ming and Qing periods, the practice gradually moved from refined elite taste into folk custom, while the symbolic quality of the plum — “blooming alone in the cold” — remained unchanged.

During Minor Cold, visitors can go to major plum gardens. Meihuashan in Nanjing, Xiangxuehai in Suzhou, Chaoshan in Hangzhou, and Wuxi Plum Garden are open in winter, and checking bloom conditions in advance is recommended. One can also look for wintersweet in parks and courtyards and experience the poetic atmosphere of “墙角数枝梅，凌寒独自开” — several branches of plum beside the wall, blooming alone against the cold.

During Minor Cold, many northern regions have a tradition of drinking mutton soup. Mutton is warm in nature and has the effects of tonifying deficiency, resisting cold, warming, and nourishing qi and blood, making it an excellent winter food. In Shandong, Hebei, and elsewhere, people like to stew a pot of mutton soup on Minor Cold: the meat is cut into pieces and blanched, then slowly simmered with ginger, scallion, Sichuan peppercorn, and other ingredients until the broth becomes milky white and deeply fragrant. A single bowl warms the entire body. In Inner Mongolia, people prepare “hand-held mutton” by boiling large bone-in pieces of lamb in plain water with only salt added, then slicing off pieces with a knife and dipping them in chive-flower sauce, preserving the meat’s original flavor.

The tradition of eating mutton in winter has a long history in northern China. Traditional Chinese medicine considers mutton warm in nature, with the effects of replenishing qi and deficiency and warming the middle and lower body, making it particularly suited to cold winter weather. Minor Cold falls around the sanjiu period, when temperatures are at their lowest, so drinking mutton soup both dispels cold and warms the body while nourishing qi. The custom expresses the traditional wisdom of “medicine and food sharing the same source” and the dietary philosophy of “not eating foods out of season.”

During Minor Cold, one can visit northern restaurants for mutton soup, lamb-spine hotpot, and other winter foods. It can also be made at home: blanch the mutton, add ginger, scallion, Sichuan peppercorn, and other seasonings, and simmer slowly for two hours. Eat the meat and drink the broth to warm the body and dispel the cold.

During Minor Cold, most of northern China enters the coldest part of the year. Ice on rivers and lakes reaches its greatest thickness, creating firm and level surfaces that are ideal for winter recreation. Skating, riding ice sleds, whipping ice tops, and playing ice hockey become some of the liveliest scenes of the season.

Ice games take many forms. One of the most traditional is the ice sled, a simple wooden sled on which a person sits or squats and propels themselves across the ice using two metal ice picks. The speed may not be great, but the enjoyment is considerable. Whipping an ice ga, or ice spinning top, is another classic northern game: the top is struck with a whip and spins rapidly across the frozen surface. Tug-of-war, wrestling, racing, and other contests are also held on ice. In recent years, winter entertainment has become even more varied, with ice bicycles, ice go-karts, ice slides, and other attractions adding new vitality to traditional ice games. In winter, the ice rinks at Beihai, Shichahai, and the Summer Palace in Beijing are crowded with visitors, who play freely on the frozen surface and use laughter to drive away the severe cold.

Ice games have a long history in northern China. According to the *History of Song · Treatise on Rites*, records of activities on ice already existed during the Song dynasty. During the Yuan dynasty, such activities became even more widespread among the people. Under the Qing, ice games were formally incorporated into state institutions under the name “bingxi”, becoming an important winter activity of the imperial court. The Qianlong Emperor repeatedly reviewed ice games at Taiye Pond, today’s Beihai, and ordered court painters to create the *Painting of Ice Games*, which has survived to the present. Among ordinary people, ice games were one of the most important forms of winter recreation. The custom transforms the severe climate of the north into a distinctive form of sport and entertainment and expresses the optimistic Chinese disposition of “finding joy amid hardship.”

During Minor Cold, visitors can experience winter activities at urban park ice rinks across the north. Beihai Park, Shichahai, and the Summer Palace in Beijing, as well as the Songhua River ice rinks in Harbin, are popular destinations. Ice rinks rent skates and sleds. First-time skaters can use an ice sled or ice bicycle, which are relatively safe and easy to learn. Officially managed rinks should be chosen, and unmanaged frozen rivers should be avoided.

After Minor Cold, the year-end draws near, and every household begins major cleaning and purchasing New Year goods in preparation for Spring Festival. Sweeping away dust is an important part of pre-New Year preparations: people clean the house inside and out, wash bedding and curtains, scrub pots, bowls, and kitchenware, and give the practice the meaning of “removing the old and establishing the new.” All poverty, bad luck, and inauspiciousness are symbolically swept out of the door so that the new year can be welcomed in a clean and orderly home. At the same time, families begin buying New Year goods — Spring Festival couplets, New Year pictures, firecrackers, sweets, cakes, and other items — and the atmosphere of the coming New Year becomes steadily stronger.

The custom of sweeping away dust has a long history. The *Book of Rites · Monthly Ordinances* contains a record of “sweeping dust in the twelfth month.” The ancients noted the homophony between “尘”, dust, and “陈”, old or stale, so sweeping dust came to signify “removing the old and establishing the new,” bidding farewell to the old year and welcoming the new. The custom has been transmitted from generation to generation and remains one of the most important household rituals before the Chinese New Year.

After Minor Cold, households can carry out a thorough cleaning, wash household items, purchase New Year goods, and experience the tradition of “sweeping away dust to welcome the New Year.”

Although Minor Cold falls in the depths of winter, agricultural work does not stop completely. In northern China, farmers use the winter slack season to build and repair irrigation works, accumulate and prepare fertilizer, and repair farm tools in preparation for spring cultivation. In southern China, Minor Cold is a critical period for managing overwintering crops such as winter wheat and rapeseed, requiring attention to protection against cold and frost as well as clearing ditches and draining excess water. Agricultural sayings include “小寒大寒，冷成冰团”, “小寒不寒，清明泥潭”, and “小寒寒，惊蛰暖” — sayings that summarize climatic experience accumulated by farmers through long observation.

The agricultural customs of Minor Cold are the product of thousands of years of Chinese farming civilization. Through long-term observation, farmers identified relationships between Minor Cold weather patterns and agricultural production and developed a rich body of agricultural sayings and practical knowledge, transmitted orally from generation to generation.

During Minor Cold, visitors can go to rural areas to learn about winter-slack agricultural activities such as irrigation construction and fertilizer preparation. Agricultural tourism parks also remain open in winter, offering opportunities to learn about the management of overwintering crops.