Every New Year, my mother will be busy preparing for the whole twelfth lunar month, pushing the mill to roll millet to spread hearth cakes, pushing millet to steam sticky nests, and washing wheat, grinding flour, steaming flower cakes and flower cakes for fish and flowers. On the 28th of the twelfth lunar month, my mother put two pots of noodles on Kang's hair and covered it with a thick quilt. When the noodles are sour and full of joy, they will be steamed. Knead the dough on the chopping board of the heatable adobe sleeping platform, with red dates, black pepper seeds, aniseed seeds and rouge on one side and kitchen knives, scissors, awls, stalks, eyebrows and grates on the other. Mother rubbed, pinched, pulled, cut, rubbed, glued and magically turned into a bunch of small animals. When flowers and flowers and birds are singing, my mother carefully carried these little creatures to the grate in the cauldron, then gently covered the lid and prayed silently with her hands folded, as if the fairy had come to my house, waiting to eat the tribute. Birds and hedgehogs ran out of the pot steaming. Mother colored the birds with chicken feathers stained with rouge. The little hedgehog's eyes are shining, pressing the pepper seeds, and the little pointed nose is burning rouge and stinging, just like living. The big flower cake has layers of flowers lined with big red dates, which means rising step by step.

At that time, people in our village visited relatives and friends, solemnly carrying flower baskets and putting fragrant flowers and cakes. Mengchang Village, located on the south bank of Zhu Long, is a village with a long history. According to the county records, Meng Changjun, one of the four gentlemen of the Warring States, once recruited and opened a shop here to entertain guests. Meng Changjun spent all his money, and the reputation of thousands of diners spread for two thousand years, hence the name Mengchang Village. "Meng Changjun Zidian came a thousand miles to vote" is the history of Mengchang Village and the pride of its people. Before liberation, there was Tian Wenmiao in Mengchang Village. He entertained his guests with flowers and friendship, and later generations built a temple to commemorate him. Tribute in the temple, flower cake, is a must. Mengchang's village is simple. Is the benevolence and righteousness between neighbors a legacy from Meng Changjun, or is it a flower cake inheritance between relatives?

I always feel that these flowers and cakes are not only entertaining people but also entertaining gods. Otherwise, why do people use them to show their respect?

My home, not only my home, at that time, there were bricks outside every household, and the rough houses inside were very thick and the room volume was not large. Without exception, there is a niche in the middle of the north wall of each room, which is dedicated to the jade emperor, and his mother calls him a god. Above the stove, next to the smoky stove, there is also a shrine dedicated to the kitchen god. This flower cake is for God and Kitchen God. But every time God and Kitchen God are reluctant to take a bite, they are left to our brothers and sisters to eat. Mom and dad eat yellow-green steamed bread smoked with white flour mixed with white flour and sulfur. I asked my mother why the fairy didn't touch our flower cake. Mother said, the spirit of sincerity, God has eaten. I think immortals and mortals eat differently.

After the end of the new year, children began to miss flower cakes again, which will take more than 300 days.

Life is irregular. Just as the children are looking forward to the Chinese New Year, there will always be old people who die in the village. In addition to crying for the dead old man, the daughters of the old man are also invited to steam and fry flowers, which is the last filial gift of the old man. There are rules for funerals. I remember that in the mournful suona, the son-in-law of the deceased old man would take two people carrying a bright red lunch box at least three stories high to mourn for the old man. Sadly, we don't want to see this scene, but we like the tribute in the box. The older generation said that eating tribute is good, courage is big, and evil spirits should not be near.

I grew up in the water and soil along the Zhu Long River, and the cultural characteristics of Mengchang Village are flowing in my blood. Maybe all my luck comes from the blessing of flower cakes.

When my aunt gets married, it is fashionable to steam lunch boxes for her husband's elders. There is no shortage of flowers here. I remember that three aunts in the village were teachers and the rest were boys. I saw that a noodle in my third aunt's hand seemed to have life. First, rub the two noodles into strips, and then pick up the dragon's spine with a horned faucet. The curved straw and thin eyebrows printed the forest of dragons, and the third aunt pulled it a few times, and the dragon tail came out. Two dragons cross, and there is a round dough in the middle, which is the dragon ball. The flower cake made by my aunt is even more vivid. The two dragons play with pearls and the phoenix spreads its wings, which is the top grade that people scramble to collect. Unfortunately, with the death of the older generation such as Sangu, the folk craft of flower cake has disappeared in our village. I often think that maybe Sangu is a tribute and a sacrifice of the old times.

I vaguely remember praying for rain when I was a child. Twelve widows surrounded the official pit with brooms (it is said that officials would go out once around the official pit, and then the geomantic omen was broken by southerners). The men bowed and prayed, and there was a big basket next to the burning incense sticks. The offerings in it were fragrant flowers, which were played by children. The rest of the bran was fed to Xiao Lv ... "Strangely enough, after a long drought without rain, or on the same day, or on the third day of March, a pouring rain will come as scheduled. Did the flower cake touch the Dragon King? What magical power does this flower cake have, and can act as an emissary between heaven and earth?

Nowadays, the New Year has lost a lot of flavor, New Year pictures have faded out of people's sight, and flower cakes have disappeared in many villages. In some places, rescue protection makes flower cakes an intangible heritage. In Huanghua, I ate the flower cake printed with a mold, which brought me a surprise and deeply regretted the disappearance of the flower cake in my hometown. The flower cakes in Mengchang Village are different from those in Shandong and other places. They are decorated with colorful patterns on the big steamed bread. Mengchang village is formed independently and has its own characteristics. In just a few decades, thousands of years of craftsmanship or customs have disappeared and become something to be rescued. I don't know whether to be happy or sad. Flower cakes were seen every year when we were young. We lost a lot of precious things when we got them. Some so-called superstitions that I thought when I was a child were actually the harmony between man and nature. Nature has nurtured mankind, and it is natural for mankind to communicate and pray with the "God" in the dark with the most precious things. There is nothing wrong with awe. Is the flower cake in Mengchang Village related to Meng Changjun? Is the simplicity and simplicity of the people in chang meng Village the result of their upbringing?

There is no doubt that Uncle Hua is the spirit of wheat, the crystallization of human wisdom and the gift of nature. A few days ago, I went to the provincial museum, where there were gold and jade clothes from the Han Dynasty, long-character palace lanterns, colorful treasures from Zhongshan in the Warring States period, and porcelain from Dingyao and Cizhou kilns. More cultural relics have the body temperature of ordinary people, such as bronze tripod, casserole, coarse porcelain bowl, copper ladle and pots of various materials. Walking between history and reality, I thought of flower cake, and I thought of its origin and inheritance. Bronzes are ancient weapons and ritual vessels, representing status and rank, and also carrying the mission of defending the country. Therefore, "Zuo Zhuan" said that "the great event of the country lies in respecting peace and glory". The poor should also offer sacrifices and pray to God to eliminate disasters and bring happiness. Sacrifice to the living in ancient times, followed by cattle and sheep. Is flower cake the inheritance of this custom? I once visited the ancestors of Banpo, and there were still shells, animal bones and carbonized grains in the ancestral sacrifice area. On the wall, there is a note in "Lu's Spring and Autumn Annals": "There is food to donate soil, and there is reward; Cereal sacrifices to the earth are also gods. " Presumably, sacrifice is the ancestor's pious reverence for nature. Isn't Uncle Hua the inheritance of ancestor sacrifice?

Now the Spring Festival is coming, and the flower cake will never be seen again. Those flowers and cakes, those craftsmen who steamed them, those customs and traditions disappeared together in the wind of their hometown, but they are still fresh in their memories.