Thinking of my father's spring rolls, lotus root cakes and ten fragrant lai, my mother's mullet roe and perennial lai, and the whole family sharing the taste of New Year's Eve dinner around the table in the dim light always reminds me of myself, just because it is actually the taste of my home before I got married in Holland. Every Spring Festival, I will choose a day to go out with my parents to buy new year's goods, go home with my bag, have a cup of tea, catch my breath and roll up my sleeves. The annual New Year's Eve dinner should not be sloppy. You need to get the materials ready as soon as possible, so that you won't be so busy when you do it on New Year's Eve afternoon. Hometown dishes: Spring rolls, egg dumplings, lotus root cake spring rolls and egg dumplings should be wrapped, spread out and frozen for several days. Stew the broth early, and serve the tendons and fish lips first. Without these materials, it would not be a "family portrait" (that is, a hodgepodge) symbolizing the happiness of family reunion. Make spring rolls first. There must be no fried spring rolls on the dinner table. Golden spring rolls are shaped like gold bars. Eating fried spring rolls during the Spring Festival not only means welcoming the Spring Festival, but also reflects people's pragmatic psychology of seeking money to ensure food and clothing for their families, rather than being literate. Dad has a handsome personality and doesn't care about seeking money. However, the tradition in my hometown is like this, and the old people insist on obeying it. My spring rolls tend to be in Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces, and the stuffing is shredded shrimps with leeks. Shredded pork and shrimp need to be marinated separately, fried in oil until just cooked, mixed with chopped raw chives, and added with salt and white pepper. Although the materials are not complicated, it takes time to wrap spring rolls. Dad told me that stuffing should not be greedy, so as not to burst the skin; It can't be too little, otherwise the fried spring rolls are flat and loose, and they are not full enough to look good. In addition, you need to pay attention to gestures when rolling, so as to make the spring rolls loose. The amount of weight and the weight of gestures can be handy in a few times. Children learn to wrap spring rolls and wrap them well, and they will understand the golden mean before they know it. Then, I helped my mother mix a large pot of minced meat, add ginger juice, chopped green onion, soy sauce, sesame oil and a little starch, and stir clockwise for a while to make the meat sticky. Part of this meat stuffing is evenly distributed, and the egg dumplings are wrapped with chopped cloves, and the rest can be made into lotus root cakes and fried balls. Jiaozi's skin is the hardest part. Dad is handy, and jiaozi relies on him to fry eggs. Only thin plain oil can be applied to the pot. The pot is hot, pour a spoonful of broken egg juice and shake it to make it round. While the egg juice will coagulate but not coagulate, quickly put a pinch of stuffing on the egg skin, immediately fold it in half and shovel it out of the pot. The movement should be light from beginning to end, so as not to destroy the small and lovely egg dumplings. Then we will make lotus root cake, which is also my father's hometown dish. Except for a few fellow villagers who came to Taiwan Province Province with him, I have hardly heard of anyone cooking this New Year's dish at home. It was not until the winter of the year before I moved to the Netherlands that I happened to talk to my neighbors about the custom of the New Year in social occasions. Speaking of lotus root cake, the other person's eyes lit up and said, "Yes, you must eat fried lotus root cake during the New Year. This is my mother's New Year's Eve dinner. " When asked, her mother is from Dongtai, Jiangsu, and her father who grew up in Dongtai and Nantong is a fellow villager. Because of a dish, I now feel much closer to each other and have a lively conversation. Food is really an excellent communication bridge. Lotus root cake is said to be a cake, but it is actually very similar to the fried lotus root clip in hubei cuisine. I bought a thick, waxy lotus root in the market, cooked it, cut it into two pieces that are slightly connected together like lotus leaf cakes, put minced meat in the gap of each piece, wrap it in a thin batter, fry it in an oil pan until it is slightly yellow, take it out, suck it, spread it out, then put it in the freezer, fry it in the pot until it is golden, and eat it on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. The lotus root cake just out of the pot is crisp and crisp, and it is not greasy to eat three or four pieces in a row. Necessary dishes: Ten coriander dishes are not only the dishes mentioned above, but also the dishes that must appear on my dinner table on New Year's Eve every year. There are also hot dishes such as casserole, ham chicken soup, braised gold ingot (that is, hooves), fried bacon with garlic, shrimp with bean sprouts or fried shrimp balls, and cold dishes such as Soviet-style smoked fish, braised beef tendon, salted duck or sauced duck. It can be said that ten coriander is a typical "big fish and big meat", which is a mixed vegetable and a must-have dish for Chinese New Year in hometown. This recipe has been handed down from generation to generation in our family for many years. Its materials are not expensive, and the practice is not too difficult, but it takes time and effort to pay attention to slow work and fine work, and it will never be done without patience. Ten coriander, both hot and cold. I think cold food is more delicious than hot food. Sprinkle a little sesame oil before serving and mix well with good old vinegar, which makes the taste more fragrant and refreshing. From New Year's Eve to the third day of New Year's Eve, this vegetarian dish is always at the bottom of a table of meat dishes. My family reunion dinner usually tastes like my father, and my mother, as a professional woman, doesn't care. Anyway, she seldom cooks at ordinary times, and she eats mostly Jiangsu and Zhejiang dishes cooked by the maid and her father, so she has long been used to it. However, every year, there are still two Taiwan Province-style New Year's dishes that she must cook and serve. One of them is roasted mullet roe. When grandma was still alive, mullet laid eggs near the solstice in winter, and she would go to Daxing Port in Tainan to buy mullet ovaries directly from fishermen. Once she bought them, she would ask someone to make them with salt and distribute them to her children and relatives. After my grandmother died, my mother moved to Dihua Street, which is a famous New Year's Street in Taipei with many old brands. On New Year's Eve, my mother soaked mullet roe in rice wine for a while according to grandma's practice, then carefully peeled off the outer film and baked it on red-hot charcoal until both sides were golden and bubbling. At this time, the outer layer of mullet roe seems to be burnt but not burnt, while the inner layer is seven or eight times cooked, soft and oily, and the taste is original and charming. Roasted mullet roe slices with winter radish or garlic sprouts are the most authentic way to eat. Mom is a good drinker. She likes to take a bite of mullet roe and drink brandy. She doesn't drink much, only tastes its fragrance. Another Chinese New Year dish of my mother is called "Long-year dish", which is actually mustard stewed in stock (called mowing vegetable by Minnan people in Taiwan Province Province), symbolizing "long life" and "long life". Everyone, including dad, should take a few bites at the dinner table for good luck. New Year's Eve dinner tastes bitter, and I didn't like it when I was a child. Mom said it would be sweet to chew twice more, but I still feel bitter. After growing up, perhaps because I began to taste the life situation, I don't know how much more bitter it is than growing vegetables for a long time, and finally I gradually realized the fun. My father's spring rolls, lotus root cakes and ten parsley, my mother's mullet roe and long vegetables, and the smell of reunion dinner around the table in the dim light always make me nostalgic, just because it is actually the smell of "home"