Chinese New Year, like Ramadan and the 12 days of Christmas, is an ancient holiday which lasts for a while. This year, it began on Feb. 17, and will conclude with the Lantern Festival on Tuesday, March 3. Many of my friends with pan-Asian heritages were delighted to replace the Year of the Wooden Snake with the Year of the Fire Horse — a year which only comes every 60 years.
Our last Fire Horse year was 1966 — a dynamite period in the culture. High points in music include the Beatles experimenting with studio effects and creative song-writing with “Revolver,” plus Bob Dylan’s “Blonde on Blonde.” And we saw an escalation in the struggle for Civil Rights with the March on Atlanta.
That year items which are now familiar were invented — although it took a long time for these to become commonplace. Consider the automatic teller machine (ATM), home security CCTV system, handheld calculators, the mammogram machine, and the wine box. (Okay, I don’t include the wine box as mission critical to our species, but this is “Family Recipe Box,” and it was a favorite beverage of my beloved late mother Janet Cragin.
Family and traditions
The Chinese New Year, also known as the Lunar New Year embraces family, food, and celebration in one red and gold explosion of joy. I reached out to readers about their personal traditions, and my Lunenburg High School classmate Amy Lantry wrote about her husband, Donald Jue, and their family celebration. She started with good news.
“My daughter is expecting a baby in April who will be a Horse,” she explained. “We celebrate Chinese New Year with food. My mother-in-law made Bird’s Nest Soup, Longevity Cakes, dishes with long noodles, and so much more, symbolizing long life and good fortune. We wear red or gold for good luck and don our jade jewelry.”
Also among the traditions are “to clean your house and bathe prior to New Year’s Day, but not on New Year’s Day, so you don’t wash off the good luck.” I was struck by how many of these have to do with fortune: attracting the good and dispelling the bad. Cabbages are thrown as offerings to dragons to chase the bad luck away, and fire crackers are lit for the same reason. (See recipe for what to do with your cabbage in case you don’t meet a dragon.)
Former Fitchburg Mayor Lisa Wong, the first Asian-American female mayor in Massachusetts notes that “one of my favorite parts about Lunar New Year is picking out books celebrating the holiday and bringing them to my kids’ school to share our traditions with their classmates.”
Fitchburg resident Jo Pagnotta’s grandfather emigrated from Canton, China in 1891, first to Hawaii, and then the family eventually made their way further east. She didn’t grow up with the New Year tradition, but over time, the next generation embraced it.
“My favorite part of the celebration is gathering with friends and family and seeing the young ones’ eyes when they get red envelopes,” she explains (Part of the tradition is money in the red envelopes!).
Fitchburg to China
Everyone knows that this region had a lively industrial past, but did you know that Fitchburg helped industrialize China all the way back in 1864!
Thanks to Fitchburg Historical Society who posted about a fascinating memoir by Yung Wing, born in China and educated at Yale. He writes about his experiences in “My Life in China” (published 1909). While living in New England he was astounded by the plethora of mills and machine shops. When he returned to China (a completely agrarian society), he spoke to the Viceroy in Shang Hai.
“In a large country like China, I told them, they would need many primary or fundamental machine shops, but after they had one (and a first-class one at that) they could make it the mother shop for reproducing others — perhaps better and more improved. It would be cheaper to have them reproduced and multiplied in China where labor and material were cheaper, than in Europe and America.”
The Viceroy agreed, and sends him back to America. However, in 1864, the Civil War is still raging.
“Nearly all the machine shops in the country, especially in New England, were preoccupied and busy in executing government orders,” he writes. Finally, the Putnam Machine Company in Fitchburg agrees to take the order.
What kind of machinery would this shop create? “I especially mentioned the manufacture of rifles, which, I said, required for the manufacture of their component parts separate machinery, but that the machine shop I would recommend was not one adapted for making the rifles, but adapted to turn out specific machinery for the making of rifles, cannons, cartridges or anything else.”
‘Let’s eat out!’
Yung Ming probably wasn’t the first person from China to come to Fitchburg. Perhaps the most famous (along with Mayor Wong of course!) was John Wong (distant relation) who established a beloved eating place, the Peacock Restaurant in 1907 on Prichard Street.
Since the Peacock, cooks and restaurateurs from virtually every region of Asia have settled here, and many readers had their first exposure to new tastes at two places beloved by many: Dan Chan and the Singapore.4r
They are long gone, but I’m happy to report that there are now well over a dozen Asian-themed eating places. Whether you’re looking for noodles, sushi, bulgoki, or ramen, choices abound. And for the next few weeks, wish everyone “health and prosperity” by saying “Gong Hei Fat Choy!”
In Fitchburg: Kiki’s Korean Restaurant, 35 Airport Rd., Padda Thai, 200 Lunenburg St.; China Wonder, 375 John Fitch Hwy; Gold Bowl: 22 Ashby State Rd; Fitchburg Jade, 345 Main St. Crazy Crab 336 Summer St.
In Leominster: Seoul Kitchen, 20 Central St.; Hungry Bowl, 865 Merriam Ave.; Mai Tai’s, 638 N. Main St., Arisu Korean Restaurant, 704 N. Main St., Yamato Japan, 975 Merriam Ave (Twin City Plaza); Four Season Jiang’s Kitchen, 1312 Main St.; Lemongrass: Vietnamese Cuisine, 134 Mechanic St.;
In Lunenburg: White Thai Cuisine, 177 Mass. Ave., Asian Imperial, 5 Electric Ave.
In Gardner: SawaAsian Cuisine & Lounge, 360 Timpany Blvd.
Vietnamese-style Chicken Salad
INGREDIENTS:
1/3 cup lime juice
4 tablespoon fish sauce
2 grated garlic cloves
1 red onion
2-3 cups cooked chicken
3 cups shredded cabbage
3 shredded carrots
3 sliced radishes
3 sliced jalapeno chiles
1 cup chopped cilantro
1 cup chopped peanuts
DIRECTIONS:
In a small bowl, stir together lime juice, fish sauce and garlic. Add onion and radish. In a larger bowl mix chicken, cabbage, carrots, chilies and cilantro. Add onion mixture and peanuts (save some for topping) and serve with lime quarters if desired.
Notes: Shredding all these veggies takes a while — use a box shredder and mind your fingers. Enjoy the fact that Prince Philip, the late Duke of Edinburgh used to call Queen Elizabeth “Cabbage” (after the French endearment, “mon petit choux,” which is “cabbage” en francais).
Sally Cragin would love to hear about your family recipes and stories and you can share at [email protected].
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