xiao xue

中国二四节气

Minor Snow refers to the time when it starts to snow, mostly in China's northern areas, and the temperature continues to drop.

The light snow freezes at night, but melts quickly during the day.

In China, the wind blows from the northeast frequently since the Minor Snow. Because it is not bitter yet, many people do not wear hats or scarves. In fact, according to an old Chinese saying, "the head is the place where all passages of the body gather". It is sensible to beware that one's head can't be frozen.

Thus the air indoors is dry and most people might feel their nose and mouth are dry. Their inner heat energy can't get out. Symptoms appear, including dental ulcers or more pimples on a person's face. The way to solve this problem is to drink more hot soup, such as cabbage with bean curd soup, spinach with bean curd soup and mutton with radish soup.

In some areas of south China, people have glutinous rice cakes in the early 10th lunar month, which is around Minor Snow. In ancient times, glutinous rice cake was a traditional festival offering to the bull god used by peasants.

In the past, when storage conditions were poor, people created many ways to store their food. Preserved pork is one of them. Thus even in the bitter winter, the whole family could enjoy meat without going out. Some even say preserved pork tastes better than fresh meat.

Nanjing is known for its pickled vegetables. In the past, due to inconvenient transportation, vegetables sold in Nanjing were few and expensive. Thus people there made pickled vegetables for the winter.

On cold days, people want to have some hot and spicy food to keep warm. Experts say that it is wise not to eat overly spicy food, since that will enhance inner heat.