Why We Make This Black Rice Cake Only Once a Year

Why do we make this black rice cake only once a year? In our mountain village, the black rice cake is cooked for one day only: the full moon of the seventh lunar month, when families believe their ancestors come home. This slow living film follows the whole journey. It begins at the local market a week before the festival, and then with a single leaf. Ramie leaves are dried in the sun, boiled, squeezed and pounded by hand, and that is what gives the black rice cake its deep, glossy color. Sticky rice flour and dark cane sugar are worked in, around a filling of mung beans and roasted peanuts. Grandma folds every black rice cake perfectly. The children's are less neat, and nobody minds. The cakes steam overnight over a wood fire while someone stays up to keep it burning. In the morning, daughters return home with their husbands, and the whole family shares a feast with duck on the tray. If you love rural life, traditional cooking and quiet countryside days, this black rice cake story is for you. Subscribe for more slow living from the mountains. #slowliving #villagelife #traditionalcooking #blackricecake #rurallife 0:00 Slow Living: Market Day in a Mountain Village 1:12 Traditional Cooking: Ramie Leaves for the Black Rice Cake 4:20 Wrapping Sticky Rice Cakes with Grandma 6:22 Cooking Over Fire: Steaming All Night 8:05 Rural Life: A Family Feast for the Ancestors