Going vegetarian on the first day of lunar New Year marks the initiation

of another year. Doing good to gather virtue and refraining from killing

for food connote auspice. Further, feasting on New Year' s Eve and the

subsequent day would overtax the digestive system and giving it a break

would be more beneficial than not. Hence a lot of folks resort to going

vegetarian for the entirety of New Year' s Day.

Inviting vegetarian dishes are many. Try, perhaps, preparing the everbeloved

New Year dish, le-han zhai (lohan mixed veggies), the recipe

of which is as follows: first, soak and cook dried shitake mushrooms,

jin-zhen (golden needles), yun-er (cloud-ear fungus), fa-cai (hair-like

weeds), and dried sweet tofu; second, add long napa cabbage, dried

cornstalk, sliced carrot, shelled ginkgo fruit, and sliced ginger; and

third, cook with oil, salt, and sugar. The dish makes apt offering to

the Buddhas and bodhisattvas and ancestors.