Lunar New Year Foods and Their Lucky Meanings

Lunar New Year foods are chosen as much for their names as for their flavour. A whole fish (魚) sounds like "surplus", rice cakes (糕) sound like "rising high", lettuce (生菜) like "growing wealth", and dried oysters (蠔豉) like "good business". Families share these dishes at a reunion dinner on New Year's Eve and over the first days of the year, turning the table into a string of wishes for the months ahead. Some customs are Cantonese, some come from northern China, and most families mix the two.

The reunion dinner

The most important meal of the festival is the reunion dinner (團年飯) on New Year's Eve. Relatives travel home, the generations sit together, and the table is laid with more food than anyone can finish, on purpose. In Vancouver many families hold the reunion at a restaurant, often over a long set dinner with roast meats, seafood and a whole fish, and many return for dim sum during the first days of the new year to visit with friends and relatives.

The dishes vary from family to family, but the logic is the same. Each one stands for a wish, usually through a pun in Cantonese or Mandarin, and the meal as a whole aims to cover health, wealth, family and luck.

Fish: abundance year after year

No New Year table is complete without fish. The word 魚 (yú) sounds like 餘, meaning surplus, which gives the blessing 年年有餘, "may there be abundance every year". Cantonese families usually steam the fish whole, with ginger and scallion, and serve it with the head and tail intact as a sign of a good beginning and a good end.

A common custom is to leave part of the fish uneaten, so that something is literally left over for the coming year. Some families also avoid flipping the fish on the plate, since the gesture can suggest a boat capsizing.

Cakes: nian gao and turnip cake

Steamed cakes, 糕 (gōu in Cantonese), are a Cantonese New Year essential because the word sounds like 高, "high" or "rising". Eating them wishes for a higher position, a better income or a taller child in the year ahead.

• Nian gao (年糕). The sweet one: glutinous rice flour and brown sugar, steamed into a dense, chewy cake. It is often sliced and pan-fried, sometimes dipped in egg, until the edges caramelise. Its name reads as "a higher year".
• Turnip cake (蘿蔔糕 lo bak go). The savoury one: shredded daikon radish bound with rice flour and flecked with Chinese sausage, cured pork, dried shrimp and mushroom, steamed, then sliced and pan-fried until crisp on the outside and soft within. It is also a year-round dim sum classic.
• Taro cake (芋頭糕) and water chestnut cake (馬蹄糕) often join them on Cantonese family tables.

Dumplings, lettuce and dried oysters

Dumplings (餃子). In northern China, families make dumplings together on New Year's Eve. Their crescent shape recalls old gold and silver ingots, so they stand for wealth. Cantonese families tend to favour the fried, ingot-shaped pastries called 角仔 or 油角 at New Year, but northern-style dumplings have become common in many homes.

Lettuce (生菜). In Cantonese, lettuce is saang choi, which sounds like 生財, "growing wealth". It appears in stir-fries and lettuce wraps, and it is the green hung outside shops for the lion dance to "pluck" (採青).

Dried oysters (蠔豉 hou si). The name sounds like 好事 or 好市, "good things" or "good business". They are often braised with black moss (髮菜 faat choi), which sounds like 發財, "to prosper", making the classic Cantonese New Year dish 髮菜蠔豉, a wish for good business and good fortune together.

Other favourites include prawns (蝦 ha, recalling laughter, 哈哈), a whole chicken for family togetherness, long noodles for long life, and oranges and tangerines, whose names and golden colour suggest luck and gold.

Poon choi: the basin feast

Poon choi (盆菜), the "basin feast", is a New Year centrepiece in many Hong Kong and Cantonese households. Dozens of ingredients are layered in a single large basin: radish and bean curd skin at the bottom to soak up the sauce, then braised pork, chicken, roast duck, prawns, fish maw, dried oysters and mushrooms, with the most luxurious pieces on top. The whole table eats from the same bowl, which makes it a natural symbol of reunion.

Poon choi is especially associated with the walled villages of Hong Kong's New Territories. One popular story traces it to the late Song dynasty, when villagers are said to have gathered whatever food they had into wooden basins to feed a retreating emperor and his soldiers. It is a legend rather than recorded history, but it is still told at many New Year tables.

Lunar New Year at Neptune Palace

The days around New Year's Eve and the first weekend of the new year are among the busiest of the year for Chinese restaurants in Vancouver. A few practical tips:

• Book early. Reunion dinners and large family tables fill well ahead, especially on New Year's Eve itself.
• Call the location directly. Reservations at Neptune Palace are made by phone: Vancouver (604) 423-3386, Burnaby (Brentwood) (604) 566-0897.
• Count your table. For a family of four or six, our set dinners for four and six keep ordering simple.
• Mention elders and children. Let the team know about dietary needs when you book.

At both our Vancouver (Marine Gateway) and Burnaby (Brentwood) locations, dim sum is served from the morning until 3pm and dinner from 5pm. For a New Year yum cha, our Pan-Fried Daikon Radish Cake is a natural choice, alongside Neptune Shrimp Dumplings and Shrimp & Pork Siu Mai with Flying Fish Roe. For a reunion dinner, the set menus for four and six bring together seafood, poultry, greens and dessert, and the six-person sets open with Peking duck. Call the location you prefer to reserve your table.

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