How to arrange a beautiful and complete traditional Mid-Autumn Festival feast.

In Vietnam, the Mid-Autumn Festival is a very special holiday for children, with many characteristic activities such as camping, carrying star-shaped lanterns, preparing traditional Mid-Autumn Festival feasts, making pomelo dogs, etc. Here is a guide to preparing a beautiful and complete traditional Mid-Autumn Festival feast.

For many Asian countries like China and Korea, the Mid-Autumn Festival is a very important holiday with the meaning of reunion and family gathering. In Vietnam, besides this meaning, the Mid-Autumn Festival is also an occasion for adults to show special attention to children. Therefore, the Mid-Autumn Festival has long become a holiday for children.

On this holiday, most families and groups organize camping trips, lantern parades to admire the moon, prepare Mid-Autumn Festival feasts, share the food, and give gifts to children.

Mid-Autumn Festival feast. (Illustrative image)

How to arrange a traditional Mid-Autumn Festival feast.

Setting up a traditional Mid-Autumn Festival feast is quite simple, usually including: lanterns, fruit, and mooncakes.

While the feast during other holidays and festivals is usually arranged formally, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, the feast focuses more on form and creativity. Depending on the skill of the person arranging the feast, it can be large, small, tall, short, and in various shapes and forms.

However, a Mid-Autumn Festival feast must always include: mooncakes, five kinds of fruit, and lanterns.

Mid-Autumn Festival feast. (Illustrative image)

1. Fruits

Depending on the region, different fruits will be chosen. However, typically, there will be characteristic Vietnamese fruits in season such as bananas, pomelos, persimmons, watermelons, custard apples, pomegranates, guavas, etc., ensuring there are at least five different types of fruit. The fruits are selected to be harmonious in appearance, balanced in color, with both green and ripe fruits symbolizing the balance of yin and yang.

You can arrange the fruits into a platter, or create a tumble doll from guava, oranges, or persimmons; or a puppy shape from pomelo... The fruit platter will be placed in the center of the Mid-Autumn Festival feast.

2. Mooncakes:

Traditional Vietnamese mooncakes come in baked and soft varieties. The most traditional filling is mixed nuts and seeds. However, nowadays, mooncakes have been modified in countless ways, with fillings of fruit, cream, milk, caramel, jelly, and more.

In terms of shape, traditional mooncakes are mainly square-shaped, but nowadays there are also varieties such as pig-shaped mooncakes, fish-shaped mooncakes, mooncakes with recessed flowers, mooncakes with raised flowers, etc.

Mooncakes are usually placed prominently on either side of a fruit plate (large mooncakes) or arranged in a circle around the fruit plate (small or shaped mooncakes).

3. Traditional types of lamps

Small lanterns or star-shaped lamps can be placed on either side of the offering tray, creating a shimmering light for the Mid-Autumn Festival feast.

If you're camping outdoors, you can hang lanterns/star-shaped lights around the table to make the atmosphere more cheerful and vibrant...

According to Infonet