Memoirs Of A Palace Maid

Seasonal Diet

"In the palace, we eat strictly according to the seasons." This is a new topic and she talked to me with great interest. "Let's take for example, New Year's Day. The night before is the thirtieth and we called it 'ci sui'.*

This day in the palace is an exceptional day. We can sleep in late. Just before eleven o'clock, we have to kowtow before the Empress Dowager to bid the old year farewell and say 'Auspiciousness to the Empress Dowager. May ten thousand things go well for the Empress Dowager.'

On the first day of the new year, we will have a spring platter, usually called a spring cake. It is a large box placed on a table, so it is also called a box dish. There are round ones and square ones. Inside this box are placed twelve, sixteen or eighteen enamelled boxes. Placed inside these boxes are finely chopped pickles and smoked dishes such as green sauce meat**, spiced belly meat, smoked belly meat, smoked chicken and so on. There is no lack of things in the palace. Dining on chicken and duck is already considered to be eating coarsely.

At this time, during all our meal times, we all have hot pots. We used them in lieu of a large clay pot because our shifts are different. We can't eat together at the same time. With a hot pot, we can have hot food. After finishing the spring platter, if you like soup, you can scoop it from your hot pot. If you like to drink porridge, there are two to three types of porridge."

She said a lot in one breath. I can only help her with errands, adding coal and topping up water in the kettle to save time for her and let her sew more clothes.

"From the first of the fifth month, there are various kind of stuffed foods, all kinds of shaped—square, pointed, twisted—dumplings. During the Mid-Autumn Festival, there are all types of mooncakes. During the Double Ninth Festival, there will be flower cakes. From the fifteenth of October onwards, we have pots for every meal. We will have hot pots and boiled mutton. In Beijing, the custom is to mix fermented vegetables, blood sausage, white meat, white chicken, and chopped belly meat together. We frequently eat this type of hot pot.

Sometimes, we will have wild chicken hot pot. Anyway, in one year, we will have hot pot for three entire months. On the sixteenth day of the first month, we swapped our hot pots for clay pots. During the Qing Ming Festival, there will be yellow pea cake, kidney bean cake, glutinous rice cakes and so on. At the beginning of summer, there will be mung bean porridge, bean porridge. When it is summer solstice, we will have jellied meat, jellied chicken, jellied belly meat and the like.

On summer days, we were given cool bowl of foods to eat, such as lotus fruit, lotus seed flour silk, almond tofu and such. We frequently eat lotus leaf porridge. They are all iced. Melons, fruits, pears and peaches are all allotted according to the seasons. The Qing court pay particular attention to food. If it is not the season for a certain food, they will not eat it."

When she recalled the memories of her past, sometimes she would reveal a sadness in her voice. Now that she was poor with nothing to her name, such sadness was natural.

Translator's Notes:

* "Ci sui" translates tentatively to bidding farewell to the year

** Green sauce meat was an signature food dish in Old Beijing. Fresh meat is repeatedly salted and pressed, then marinated in green sauce (hence its name) before it is steamed and served. The entire marination process takes a year and a half. Five pounds of fresh meat will only yield under two pounds of green meat. It is a time-consuming and expensive food to make. The fact that over a thousand palace servants were dining on such costly cuisine is an indication of the wealth and extravagance of the Forbidden City at the time.