Tanggong

Tanggong, made from sweetened sticky rice, is a Hainan specialty and a must-eat for many locals during the CNY period. This snack dates back to the Ming Dynasty, when it was sent as a tribute to the imperial court, and derives its name from both top-shelf ingredients and careful preparation methods, which results in the treat’s traditional pale color and crunchy texture. In Fenghui Village, Huiwen Town, Wenchang City, Hainan Province, many families still maintain the custom of making handmade tanggong every Lunar New Year, filling every home with the sweet aroma of this mouthwatering dessert.

Envelope Wafers

Envelope wafers, which date back to the early 20th century, are a traditional Lunar New Year snack in Huiwen Town, Wenchang City, Hainan Province. In the 1930s and 40s, many people from Huiwen went to Southeast Asia to earn money. Longing for their hometown, they shaped this snack, originally from Singapore, into envelopes, carrying their heartfelt sentiments back home. Since then, the craft of making envelope wafers has been passed down through generations in Huiwen. Today, envelope wafers carry the meaning of reunions and happiness, and have become a traditional snack during Spring Festival. They are believed to bring good fortune for the coming year.

Brown Sugar Rice Cake

Brown sugar rice cakes are a popular Hainan dessert that are traditionally consumed during CNY celebrations. These cakes are also called ‘nian gao’, or ‘year cakes’, which sounds like the phrase ‘higher year by year’, giving these treats a lucky connotation.

The names for this treat and methods for making it differ across the island. In Qionghai, they are called ‘tianba’, while in Sanya, they are known as ‘tanggaomo’.

Traditionally, the cakes are made from sticky rice and brown sugar. Freshly steamed cakes are chewy and sweet, like soft pieces of candy. The reddish-brown color is also thought to be lucky.

Sticky Rice Cake

Making sticky rice cakes is a traditional Spring Festival custom of the Li people of Hainan. Cooked sticky rice is pounded into a ball in a large mortar and pestle by a group of people working together. Then, it’s kneaded and pinched into small balls, flattened, placed on a surface, and cooled.

The round cakes symbolize a prosperous CNY, good weather in the upcoming year, and also represent family reunions and happiness.

Danzhou Crimson Snapper

In Danzhou, Hainan, where ‘no meal is complete without fish’, dried crimson snapper is an essential New Year's commodity and a top-quality gift for visiting relatives and friends.

Crimson snapper represents good fortune and prosperity, and has become a symbol of the new year in Danzhou, representing the joyful, lively atmosphere of the city and the desire for family reunions. The fresh-caught fish are sliced, scaled, gutted, and then scored along the grain of the flesh, then marinated with sea salt, rinsed, and hung to air dry in the sun. The dried fish is then combined with a variety of ingredients to create many visually appealing, tasty dishes such as crimson snapper clay pot rice, braised crimson snapper with pork belly, and crimson snapper eggplant casserole.

Lingao Cuttlefish

There is one dish that is completely indispensable on the CNY dinner table in Lingao, Hainan - cuttlefish. In Lingao, cuttlefish is called ‘hong’, which sounds like the word for ‘smooth sailing." Eating ‘hong’ in the New Year is a wish for a smooth and successful year ahead.

Baisha Fish Tea

Fish tea is a specialty of the Hainan Li and Miao people, and is a popular dish in the Baisha area, where local Li and Miao people gather during festivals to chat and enjoy the unique flavor of fish tea together.

Although it’s called tea, this dish has nothing to do with the popular steeped beverage. It’s made primarily from freshwater fish, pork, beef, cooked rice, and cornmeal, and is also known as pickled fish. The flavor is sour and somewhat salty, and the dish features a soft, slightly chewy texture. The more pungent the aroma, the better is tastes!

Wenchang Chicken

If you ask what the typical main dish on the Chinese New Year dinner table in Hainan is, the answer is undoubtedly Wenchang chicken. No festival meal is complete without chicken, and it’s not Spring Festival in Hainan without one. Why? The word for chicken sounds very much like the word for ‘lucky’, and so the dish has come to symbolize good fortune and great luck.

Wenchang chicken, one of Hainan’s four signature dishes, is tender, with a light, natural flavor and a smooth texture. The rich, meaty aroma is mouthwatering, and the excellent flavor keeps you coming back for bite after bite.

Although white-cut, or poached chicken is very popular in Hainan during Spring Festival, there are plenty of other ways to prepare these prized poultry, including coconut chicken, salt-baked chicken, ‘yellow-skin’wampee chicken, coconut milk chicken, coffee chicken, chicken cooked in a pork belly, and many more, each offering a glimpse into the culinary preferences and regional characteristics of different parts of the island province.

Veggie Stew

Veggie stew is a traditional Hainanese dish consumed on the first day of the lunar new year. This vegetarian dish signifies a commitment to honoring life, purity, and cleanliness in the upcoming year.

Each ingredient adds a different meaning to this dish: ‘long thread moss’ symbolizes wealth and prosperity, beets provide sweetness and happiness, water celery signifies diligence and hard work, green garlic brings eloquence and resourcefulness to the mix, scallions sound like the Hainanese saying that each year will be better than the last, and arrowhead mushrooms are pronounced like the Hainanese word for ‘removing the old’, which reminds diners to say goodbye to the old year and welcome the new.

Ding’an Veggie Wraps

Ding’an veggie wraps symbolize reunion and wealth, and represent completeness. In Ding'an, Hainan, on the third day of the Lunar New Year, people don’t visit each other or exchange New Year's greetings, as is typical in other parts of the country on this day. Instead, every household prays to the God of Wealth, and the whole family sits together to eat veggie wraps to ward off gossip and misfortune.

These veggie wraps are made with a variety of different ingredients with no fixed recipe, allowing for variations in personal taste and availability of different items, with over twenty possible ingredients. They are also eaten in a fairly unique way. First, sauce is drizzled onto fresh lettuce leaves, then stir-fried rice and other vegetable ingredients are added. The lettuce is then rolled into a wrap around the filling, and eaten by hand. This dish symbolizes unity and wealth preservation.