The Laba Festival originated in ancient times and was a sacrificial ceremony used by ancestors in the Central Plains to worship ancestors and gods, praying for good harvest and good fortune.

According to the "Sacrificial Records. Special Sacrifice of the Suburbs", the La Festival is "in December of the year, all things gather and seek for them."

In the Xia Dynasty, La Day was called "Jiaping", in the Shang Dynasty, "Qing Sheng" and in the Zhou Dynasty, "Da Wax"; because it was held in December, it was called the twelfth lunar month, and the La Festival was called the La Day. After the changes of the years, the period of "La Day" was constantly changing, and after the Southern and Northern Dynasties, it was fixed on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month every year, called "La Ba".

Over the years, the "Laba Festival" has become an important representative of traditional Chinese folk customs. The descendants of Yan and Huang from south to north have expressed their wishes for a better life through various means on this day.

Originally, this festival was not paid much attention to in northwestern Yunnan. After all, there were big differences between the customs and habits of ethnic minorities here and the Central Plains civilization.

After the Xiao family moved from the Yangtze River Basin to Ginkgo Village, they also brought civilization and traditional customs of the Central Plains, and the Laba Festival became a more grand festival in Ginkgo Village.

On this day of the year, every household in Ginkgo Village cooks Laba porridge and prepares various sacrificial supplies. From this day on, Ginkgo Village begins to enter the countdown for the preparations for the Spring Festival.

Although the city’s emphasis on various traditional customs is declining year by year and the New Year atmosphere of the Spring Festival is becoming increasingly light, in Ginkgo Village, people are still following many traditional customs. In the eyes of many people, this conservative power is undoubtedly a regression of social civilization, but it has retained a unique charm that cannot be purchased by commodity society!

The various sacrifices of the Xiao family are uniformly held in the old house every year, so the people who make the decision are naturally the old man and the old lady. Xiao Feng and other juniors just need to take action.

As the highlight of today's Laba porridge, it is naturally handed over to experienced and powerful elder sisters, second sisters, older sisters, second sisters, second sisters, and other young wives and girls who follow them to study.

The ingredients used for cooking Laba porridge are different due to the different products in different places, but rice, carrots and vegetables are the three essential treasures.

Xiao Feng took the time to go into the kitchen and took a look. My elder sister had prepared various ingredients such as peanuts, ginkgo, soybeans, lotus seeds, oil tofu, etc., and only needs to be added to the large pot in order and boiled over low heat.

From a certain perspective, the method of making Laba porridge is not difficult, it is more of a symbolic meaning. People try to use various ingredients to aggregate them together to express people's joy for a good harvest and their longing for the future.

Because the Xiao family has slaughtered too many black pigs this year and marinated a large number of ham, bacon, sausages and pork ribs, the New Year pigs are not killed. However, for this year's sacrifice, the old man decided to kill a sheep and use the whole sheep to worship his ancestors and various gods.

The Xiao family has always attached great importance to the sacrificial activities of the Laba Festival. If there is no whole sheep, at least one pig's head, and whole chickens, ducks and fish are also indispensable. In addition, there are all kinds of dried fruits, fruits, snacks, and dried fruits.

After breakfast, Xiao Feng and Xiao Qiang rushed to the home of Xiao Siye, a professional sheep breeder, and pulled a fat goat that had been selected. It will be one of the protagonists today.

Mr. Xiao was the best hunter and herb collector in the Ginkgo Village and even the entire Biluo Snow Mountain. After the hunting ban over the years, he and his children and grandchildren grazed sheep in a valley next to Jinghu, becoming a well-known sheep breeder.

A few years ago, due to the inconvenient transportation in Ginkgo Village and no tourists arrived, Xiao Siye's sheep could only be sent to Yuji Town in sporadic and sold to Erdao dealers or butchers. It was not only troublesome, but the price was not high.

The development of Jinghu Scenic Area has allowed Xiao Siye’s family to make a beautiful comeback.

Since the goats at Xiao Siye’s house are the most tender, every time the village organizes a bonfire party, the protagonists who roast the whole sheep are raised by Xiao Siye’s house.

After the second half of this year, the tourists flocked to Xiao Siye’s home immediately made the local black goats popular. In the past few months, Xiao Siye sold at least 200 adult black goats, with an income of more than 100,000 yuan!

In fact, there are many families in the village who are also raising the same breed of black goats, but regardless of their growth, meat quality, survival rate, etc., they cannot be compared with the Xiao Siye family. Tourists are all designating the products of Xiao Siye family.

The elderly in the village know that Mr. Xiao Si has a secret recipe passed down from his ancestors. He adds various herbs to the water he feeds to the goat every day, which not only enhances the goat's disease resistance, but also increases the growth rate and improves the meat quality.

The goats from Xiao Siye’s family are not only not as scented as ordinary goats, but also have a faint fragrance of plants and trees. The flesh is tender and nourishing and warm, which can be said to be the best among goats. Unfortunately, Ginkgo Village is too far from the city, and no matter how good the sheep raised by Xiao Siye’s family is, it is undoubtedly a pity.

Perhaps, with the development of Jinghu Scenic Area, this situation will be improved.

After the goat was brought back, the water in the big pot on the dam had already boiled, and Xiao Jinhao was waiting with a ruler and a dagger.

After filtering the sheep blood and removing foreign matter such as blood foam and wool, add a little salt to stand, and then add the ingredients after chopping and frying, it will make a delicious bowl of raw sheep blood.

Because the goats from Xiao Siye’s family have been eating herbs for many years, the sheep’s blood contains a large amount of nourishing ingredients. Eating sheep’s blood raw can nourish yin and moisten the lungs and strengthen the body!

Perhaps in the eyes of people elsewhere, drinking raw sheep blood is a very barbaric behavior, but in Ginkgo Village, everyone has long been accustomed to it. If you kill sheep and not drink raw sheep blood, you will feel a little uncomfortable, as if something is missing.

After the goat faded, it cuts it from the middle to maintain its complete shape, and then puts up various secret sauces. The whole sheep is steamed in a large pot, which has become an important sacrifice for the Xiao family's sacrifice and is also a special dish for Xiao Jinhao - steamed whole sheep.

The key to steaming whole sheep lies in the heat, sauce and the fine wines that Xiao family has stored for many years. These three are indispensable. This is also one of Xiao Jinhao's unique skills in the rural banquet industry in western Yunnan County.

In order to make this year's steamed whole sheep taste better, Xiao Feng secretly replaced the water in the steamer with a space spiritual spring, and the strong fragrance came out, which made Xiao Feng look forward to it.

In the evening, under the leadership of the old master, the Xiao family first worshipped their ancestors in front of the ancestral tablets of the Xiao family lineage, and then worshiped the door gods, kitchen gods and other gods in a fixed place in the old house. Then, dozens of people from the Xiao family went to the Xiao family's ancestral hall to worship the common ancestors of the Xiao family. Today's worship activity ended.

For Xiao Feng, he did not think that this was a feudal superstition. On the contrary, he felt that this slightly complicated ritual could better enhance the family's cohesion and centripetal force. The reason why the huge Xiao family can still maintain sufficient unity is that the annual collective sacrificial activities are of great contribution.

The various worships before the Spring Festival are mostly based on each household, each house, each vein, and the main body. Only the sacrificial activities on the first day of the Lunar New Year are collective activities of the entire Xiao family. On that day, as long as the members of the Xiao family can come back, they will be present. Hundreds of people squeezed the entire ancestral hall full of it, and the scene is spectacular.

The old man is already planning that the sacrificial activities of this year's Spring Festival must be held grandly. After all, the Xiao family is about to take off. As the patriarch, he will pay tribute to his ancestors for the joyful events that have happened this year.

The sacrificial activities end before 6 pm. After all, it is dark early in winter in the mountains, and night begins to fall after 6 o'clock!

Almost at the same time, every household in Ginkgo Village had a variety of rich and charming food aromas, and the villagers were celebrating the harvest of the past year in this way.

…………

At the Xiao family, nearly 30 people surrounded three tables firmly, and the lively atmosphere almost overturned the roof.

Because the weather is cold, Xiao Jinhao prepared a steaming spicy hotpot with pork bones and chicken hangings, which is one of the most popular dishes in the cold northwestern Yunnan region.

The various vegetables used for hot pot are harvested from the vegetable garden before it snows. This heavy snow also reminded Xiao Feng that some greenhouses should be prepared in the coming year to ensure the supply of fresh vegetables throughout the year.

Cut a plate of steamed lamb with skin and dipped it in a special hot sauce. Xiao Feng felt that his whole mouth was filled with solid lamb, and a feeling of happiness arose. Compared with roasted lamb, the steamed lamb is not greasy at all. The strong lamb skin and the delicate lean meat add melt-in-the-mouth fat meat to form a multi-layered taste, which makes people unable to stop.

Although this is not the first time Xiao Feng has tasted this kind of delicacy, he has to sigh that the third master Xiao Jinhao's craftsmanship is indeed well-deserved!

Xiao Feng plans to wait for the Jinghu Scenic Area to get on track in the future and have a large number of customers, and let Sanye open a private restaurant in the village, which can not only use Sanye's skills, but also further increase his income. In Xiao Feng's view, as long as Sanye provides various top-level ingredients, his craft will definitely make rapid progress and produce more delicious food.

Xiao Jinhao is unwilling to enter the company or farm, so he becomes the owner and chef of a private restaurant, which is a good idea.

…………

After eating Laba porridge, it means that it has officially entered the preparation stage for the Spring Festival. All households have begun to prepare New Year’s goods to welcome the arrival of the new year.

Compared to the city's all-weather and wide range of supermarkets, due to the inconvenience of transportation and material exchange in northwestern Yunnan, it is not easy for villagers to prepare all kinds of New Year's goods. Even many mountain people with family difficulties need to take the various mountain goods accumulated at home to the market to sell them in order to buy the New Year's goods they don't have.

At this time of year, Yuji Town, which is located in Fengji in Qitian, has become the most important material distribution center in the ten miles and villages. Mountain residents and vendors from all directions gather together. While conducting material exchanges, it also brings a strong festive atmosphere to this mountainous area!

For people in the mountains, the market is an indelible mark!
Chapter completed!