What is the real Korean New Year offering tray?

The real Korean New Year 3/3 is quite attentive by many families in Vietnam, although the real Korean New Year worship is not a high tray, full of feasts like other Tet holidays. That is why the offering trays for ancestors on this day always include some special items.
Because the real Korean New Year means that every restaurant eats cold food, on this day, the drifting plates and vegetarian cakes – with the pure flavor of heaven and earth – are always prepared to offer to their ancestors. the most important offerings that make up a distinct feature for the real Korean New Year in Vietnam. Therefore, people in some northern regions of our country also call the real Korean New Year as the day of floating cakes, vegetarian cakes.

Floating cakes, vegetarian cakes are offered to the ancestors worshiping committee on the real Korean New Year. Photo: Minh An Floating cake made small balls, outside white, in the red sugar filling, boiled in a pot of boiling water, when the cake floats on the surface, take out the water. And the vegetarian cake is rounded, flat, without filling, put on a small plate, poured sugar water on top. Place on a plate, let it cool, burn incense. Folk conception is that the number of plates, bowls of drifting cakes, and vegetarian cakes to offer is always 5 or 3. People often burn incense as 1-3 or 5 compress incense, not even light. Besides, in the ceremony, no matter how big or small, the Vietnamese people’s worship tray has fresh flowers and betel and areca, and 3 cups of water. On the ancestor altar, depending on the season, depending on the conditions of each house, families also buy 5 more fruits with five different colors representing the five elements. An ancestor tray during the Korean New Year does not need to prepare a “full tray”, but only needs to show filial piety, sincerity and wish for good things. Today, many people also enjoy making the five-color vegetarian floating cakes to offer them to their ancestors. However, according to cultural experts, this is inconsistent with the original and meaning of the Korean holiday. Because the floating cake, the original vegetarian cake is white, the circle is full of expressing the aspiration for the good, full and pure things in life. According to folk beliefs, floating cake often has a square cut of sugar, round the outside of the shell. The yin-yang is the same as the saying ‘mother is round and square.’ The yellow green bean paste represents yin, the crust is round and white to show positive and that is the property of yin and yang harmony. It is desirable to wish for favorable, harmonious weather, as well as the summer not too hot.