Yu Sheng

This year, I had eaten a total of 3 times of Yu Sheng. Why is there a need to Lo Hei on the 7th day of the Lunar New Year?? Frankly speaking, I really don't know until I started to search google when writing this blog! But who cares about the history! Most important is I enjoy eating this healthy food and tossing the food high up saying some auspicious words and wasted many shredded carrots, cucumber,radish and whatever other ingredients onto the table! It was believed that the higher you tossed, the wish you made will come true. Well, wonder which ancestor started this saying as I felt it's actually a kind of action that leads to wasting food! But monkey see monkey do is what I will follow every year. God knows how much of vege I had wasted every year!

23rd Feb, I had my first Lo Hei with Mum and Hui. We had it at a coffeshop near clementi. After that, we went to my nanny's house to bai nian.

24th Feb afternoon, I had my second Lo Hei with my sec friends. We had it at Sushi Tei located at Holland Village. It was also a farewell gathering to Jenny who was leaving Singapore the next day back to Australia for her studies. I like the Yu Sheng at Sushi Tei. The portion was big and the salmons were really fresh!



Full version of photos
28th Feb, I had my third Lo Hei with my colleagues. Through my recommendation, we went Sushi Tei again located at Seragoon Garden. This time, the Yu Sheng was paid by the IT managers. We had our lunch at Sushi Tei and pack 3 Yu Sheng back to office. Due to some IT staffs were not able to make it for the lunch together, we decided to tabao the Yu Sheng back to office and had it during teabreak with all the IT staffs.

How many of you actually know the history of how Yu Sheng came about? Well, I have something to share...

"Yusheng or yee sang (Chinese: 鱼生; pinyin: yúshēng) is a Chinese-style raw fish salad. It usually consists of strips of raw fish (most commonly salmon), mixed with shredded vegetables and a variety of sauces and condiments, among other ingredients. Literally translated, "yusheng" means "raw fish", though it can also be taken to symbolise abundance, prosperity and vigor.

The delicacy was invented 1,500 years ago in southern Chinese coastal areas such as Chaozhou and Shantou, during the Song Dynasty. According to legend, a Chinese female deity known as Nüwa (女娲) created mankind from clay and mud on the seventh day of the first month of the Lunar New Year. From then on, this day was known as the "Birthday of Man". It is believed that the fishermen and seafarers of ancient Southern China were very observant of this myth. On this day, yusheng would be prepared in feasts or religious ceremonies, not just to commemorate the event but also to show respect to Nüwa. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, many of these fishermen immigrated to Southeast Asian countries like Malaysia and Singapore in search of a better life. They brought this traditional dish along with them. Yu Sang originated in Kuala Lumpur as far back as in the early 1950's. It was a dish available only after the Chinese New Year when the restaurants reopened, and diners had the dish as a starter,to raise 'good luck' for the coming year.This dish was then adopted in time throughout the then Malaya as it was evident that it was popular and for the restaurants, a very profitable dish despite the labour intensiveness of chopping and slicing the ingredients. With the advent of electrical devises, preparation was made easier but purists in Kuala Lumpur still only frequented restaurants that prepared the ingredients by hand.In 1964, yusheng began to be associated with Chinese New Year (CNY) festivities in restaurants in Singapore. Mr. Tham Mui Kai, the head chef at Lai Wah Restaurant of Singapore, offered this unique CNY dish that combined raw slices of a local fish with a melange of ingredients including shredded carrots, turnips, ginger and jellyfish. In addition, he pioneered the idea of pre-mixing the yusheng sauce in a mix of plum sauce, salt and pepper before serving the dish. Soon after, other restaurants and eateries in Singapore and Hong Kong adopted this practice.

Now, in the 21st century, "Lo Hei" -- tossing yusheng -- is a CNY custom for families and friends to gather around the table and, on cue, proceeding to toss the shredded ingredients into the air with chopsticks while saying 吉祥话 (Jíxiáng Huà, auspicious wishes) out loud to mark the start of a prosperous new year.

Typical ingredients include: fresh salmon, daikon (white radish), carrot, red pepper (capsicum), ginger, kaffir lime leaves, Chinese parsley, chopped peanuts, toasted sesame seeds, Chinese shrimp crackers (or fried dried shrimp), five spice powder. The dressing is made primarily from plum sauce."