On lunar New Year’s Day, the Koreans liked to make and have such drinks as fruit punch and sweet drink made from fermented rice along with various kinds of national foods.
The fruit punch with a dried persimmon floating in an infusion of ginger and cinnamon is known as a traditional drink peculiar to the Korean nation.
The drink is made as follows:
First, boil sliced ginger and crumbled cinnamon in different vessels respectively because if they are boiled together, their individual fragrance and taste are removed and reduced, producing no taste peculiar to the fruit punch. Then, filter the infusions through cloth to mix them and dissolve honey in the mixture. Now float a swollen dried persimmon and pine nuts on it. The fruit punch thus has a refreshing, sweet and spicy taste.
Sweet drink is also one of the drinks that the Koreans made and drank on lunar New Year’s Day. It is made by fermenting boiled rice in an infusion of malty powder.
It has a long history in Korea.
According to Koryodogyong which was compiled in the mid-13th century, paengmijang, a kind of sweet drink whose main raw material is polished rice, was made in Kaesong, the then capital city of Koryo.
The traditional recipe for the drink is as follows:
Steam clean rice in a cooking pot with charcoal fire on the lid of the pot as well so that the rice absorbs heat evenly from above and below. Put the steamed rice in a jug. Meanwhile, sieve the malty powder infusion into the jug to steep the rice. Seal the mouth of the jug with paper and put it on a hot floor for maturation before pouring cold water mixed with honey into the jug and adding jujube, chestnut, pine nut and pear to the content. This makes the drink refreshing and palatable.
The fruit punch and sweet drink were distinctive as the drinks the Koreans prepared a lot for lunar New Year’s Day. On the occasion of the holiday every year, every housewife regarded it as a custom to prepare fruit punch with sincerity to serve New Year’s callers.
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