Modern mooncake

The Moon Cake Festival or Mid-Autumn Festival (Chung Chiu), the third major festival of the Chinese calendar, is celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth month. This festival corresponds to harvest festivals observed by Western cultures, and in Hong Kong, it is held in conjunction with the annual Lantern Festival.

This festival is also known as the Moon Cake Festival because a special kind of sweet cake (yueh ping) prepared in the shape of the moon and filled with sesame seeds, ground lotus seeds and duck eggs is served as a traditional Chung Chiu delicacy.

Nobody actually knows when the custom of eating moon cake of celebrate the Moon Festival began, but one relief traces its origin to the 14th century. At the time, China was in revolt against the Mongols. Chu Yuen-chang, and his senior deputy, Liu Po-wen, discussed battle plan and developes a secret moon cake strategy to take a certain walled city held by the Mongol enemy. Liu dressed up as a Taoist priest and entered the besieged city bearing moon cake.

He distributed these to the city's populace. When the time for the year's Chung Chiu festival arrived, people opened their cakes and found hidden messages advising them to coordinate their uprising with the troops outside. Thus, the emperor-to-be ingeniously took the city and his throne. Moon cake of course, became even more famous.

The moon plays a significant part in this festival. In Hong Kong, any open space or mountain top is crowded with people trying to get a glimpse of this season's auspicious full moon....but don't let me bore on. You can read the complete article here, if you like.

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Nowadays everyone’s gotten into the act. You can get "snowy" mooncake from Taipan and icecream mooncake from Haagen-Dazs. As your faithful reporter, I consider it my duty to investigate this phenomenon. The things I do for my readers!

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Utterly failed to compose a contribution to Lasang Pinoy I! But hats off to you, fellow Pinoys. Bilib ako sa inyo.