Mooncake
When I arrived in Beijing China today Wendy, a young Chinese girl working for the festival that we are playing at (Storm Festival) greeted me with a sign with my name on it. She was adorable she raced to my exit point not loosing site of me through the crowds of people then insisted on holding my hand and arm alllll the way to the car pick up location.
I was very hungry as I slept through the meal on the flight, the flight was quite empty I had the entire row to myself (There is a God). When Wendy found out I was hungry instead of pointing to the airport coffee shop she took an offering out of her bag. It wasn’t any ordinary offering . It was a mooncake.
This mooncake came right from her home town of *Canton Province, a province in southern China her mother had sent her a pile of cakes. Mooncake is a special cake that comes around only once a year it belongs to the Mooncake Festival. Over 20000 years ago a cake festival was started to celebrate “missing your hometown” says Wendy. She told me that many people move away from their homes to work and study in the big cities and that one day a year when the moon is fullest they celebrate Mooncake Festival.
The mooncake was sweet and delicious. Made up of lotus flower, sugar and egg yoke.
Each town has a different mooncake ingredient and has change over centuries.
*Canton is where the language of Cantonese was formed.