Chinese Culture Club, Asian Culture Club, and Leadership teamed up to offer snow skin mooncake-making in the staff lounge after school on Thursday.
The event came a few days before the Mid-Autumn Festival, a 3,000-year-old Chinese holiday that celebrates the harvest and full moon on the fifteenth day of the eighth month in the Chinese Lunar calendar. Similar festivals are observed around the same day across Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Singapore.
Nearly 50 students and staff filled the lounge’s tables to learn about the Mid-Autumn Festival. Seniors and Chinese Culture Club Presidents Audrey Chao and Lawrence Chao* welcomed attendees, explaining the history behind mooncakes, including that they are sacrificed to the moon god to ring in a good harvest. Club members passed out ingredients, and students shared palpable energy and excitement to begin making mooncakes.
“I think that it’s really important because it’s not just members of Leadership and Asian Culture Club,” A. Chao said. “[Everyone is] coming together to celebrate an event and further our community.”
Each table around the room had instructions teaching students how to make a mooncake, and students with experience making mooncakes taught their friends.
Attendees pressed their dough flat, formed it into a bowl, filled it with light custard, sealed the top, and pressed it into a mold to create the characteristic design. Students finished off by chilling the mooncakes to achieve their ideal texture.
“I loved just hearing about the history of mooncakes, and actually doing it and seeing how it was just really fun to make with my friends and everything,” senior Alyssa Brew said.
A major highlight for students who attended the event was meeting new people and learning about Chinese culture while making mooncakes.
“It’s also fun coming together as a group with M-A, just working on something together,” sophomore Korn Thamsirisittikorn said.
“I thought that it was just generally really helpful for people to understand the significance behind the food besides just eating it,” A. Chao said.
As students each made and snacked on multiple mooncakes, they bonded over the confections and learned more about the traditions of the Mid-Autumn Festival from friends who celebrate at home.
*Lawrence Chao is a journalist for the M-A Chronicle.
