Every year, during the winter solstice of the Lunar New Year, jiaozi is an indispensable holiday feast for both the rich and the poor. As the saying goes, "On October 1st, every household will eat jiaozi on the solstice of winter." This custom was left in memory of Zhang Zhongjing, a "medical sage", who gave up medicine on the winter solstice.
Zhang Zhongjing is from Gedong, Nanyang. Treatise on Febrile Diseases, written by him, is a masterpiece of doctors and is regarded as a classic by doctors in past dynasties. Zhang Zhongjing has a famous saying: "if you advance, you will survive;" If you retreat, you will save the people; " If you can't be a good doctor, be a good doctor. "When the Eastern Han Dynasty was the magistrate of Changsha, he visited the sick and took medicine and practiced medicine in the lobby. Later, he resolutely resigned and went back to his hometown to treat his neighbors. When he got home, it was already winter. He saw that the villagers on both sides of the Baihe River were sallow and emaciated, hungry and cold, and many people's ears were frozen. He asked his disciples to build a medicine shed and cauldron in Dongguan, Nanyang, and to offer "Quhan Joule Decoction" to treat chilblain on the solstice of winter. He boiled the mutton and some herbs for dispelling cold in a pot, then took out the mutton and chopped the medicine, and made it into an ear-shaped Joule with bread. After cooking, he distributed two Joules and a big bowl of broth to everyone who came to ask for medicine. People ate "Joule" and drank "Quhan Decoction", and they were all hot, their ears were hot, and their frostbitten ears were cured. Later generations learned the appearance of Joule and packaged it into food, also called "jiaozi" or "flat food".