恭禧發財 Gong Xi Fa Cai

Today is New Year's Eve.

Happy New Year

No, I'm not a month late. It's Chinese New Year's Eve.
And that means that we don't shower, sweep the house, take out the trash, mop the floors, cut our hair, or do anything that could ruin our good luck for the upcoming Year of the Snake. We do, however, spend most of the day baking (or maybe that was just me) and listening to the fireworks being set off around the city.
I've made three different types of cookies today, and I have to say that they're all a success. I'm probably most proud of the first batch because they're from an iffy Pinterest recipe that I found, but they're a big hit. And so super healthy! All you do is take an old, overripe banana and mush it up (with chopsticks, if you want to do it exaaaactly like I did) then you add one cup of oatmeal. The recipe called for two bananas to one cup of oatmeal, but that ratio seemed off when I was doing it, so I just used one large banana to one cup oatmeal. I used regular oatmeal because it's all I had, but if you used some of the flavored ones, like cinnamon apple, I can only imagine that it would be delicious. Anywho, you stir your oatmeal and banana together, add in any treat-like toppings you want (hint hint, craisins and chocolate chips), drop spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet, and then bake at 350f (172c) for 10-15 minutes. Because I'm using a toaster oven all of my baking times seem slightly reduced from those in recipes. I chalk that up to the pans being that much closer to the heat source. I might make these next Sunday and take them to work for breakfast. They're like cookie breakfast bites. And I don't even like bananas very much, but these were stiiiill really good. (Mom, stop gagging.)

So many cookies

The other cookies I made were Brownie Bites, and a White Cake Mix Cookie, to which I added chocolate chips and marshmallows. My excuse for overdoing the cookies is that if you eat sweet things during the New Years celebration you'll have a sweet year, and to that I say "Suhweeeeeeeet". If there's a cosmic excuse to shove sugar into my face I am going to take it.

For those of you like me, in Morocco they say that if you start your day with something sweet you'll have a sweet day, so go ahead and add another teaspoon of sugar to that tea, the universe has sweet things in store for you when you do.

Back to New Year Stuff
Here are a couple of sites if you're interested in what the Year of the Water Snake holds in store for you:
Chinese Astrology 2013 -- this one has light text on a dark background so when Super Husband asked me to take a look at a sketch he's doing I had a hard time refocusing my eyes.
This one is weird, but you can read it if you want.

This blog has some interesting insights into ringing in the New Year in Chinese style.

What I've gleaned from living here, and also from reading all those things, is that traditions vary pretty widely depending on where your family is from. The fireworks and making lots of noise seems pretty standard for everyone. So turn that stereo up to the max, because it's gonna chase all the evil and bad luck away. And, at 12:01 be sure to throw open your windows and doors to release any evil that's been trapped inside from the year before.

So, Happy New Year! Gong Xi Fa Cai! 

My "Soo Chinese" photo, trying out Super Husband's new glasses.