Zaotang

Guandong tang refers to stick shaped candy with a thickness of 2 cm and a hollow in the center.

Zaotang are only produced around the Kitchen God Festival when most part of China is experiencing freezing weather.

[4] People in the Song dynasty started using Zaotang as a sacrifice to the Kitchen God to sweeten his words so that he wouldn't say bad things to the Jade Emperor.

Some people also say that when Zaotang melts, it becomes sticky and stick the Kitchen God's teeth so that he is unable to talk when reporting to the Jade Emperor.

Up till now, people in China still keep this tradition and produce Zaotang every year around the Kitchen God Festival.

According to Huainanzi,(淮南子） ,[6] after Yan Emperor, who was in charge of fire, died, he became the God of Kitchen to enjoy the worship of his descendants.

Rites of Zhou (周礼） [7] has indicated that the Kitchen God was Li Zhurong (黎祝融), the son of Zhuanxu who was the grandson of the Yellow Emperor.

The same kind of description also appears in Lüshi Chunqiu (吕氏春秋，Mister Lü's Spring and Autumn [Annals]）: "Zhurong, who was the descendant of Zhuanxu Emperor, became the Fire God" .

Some ancient people believed that the Kitchen God originally resided in the stove and later took on human form.

[9] Ji (Chinese: 髻) refers to the hair style of women in old times, thus some people believed the Kitchen God was a beautiful woman in red clothes.

Another historical record shows that the Kitchen God was born into human form and immediately walked into the stove after birth.

However, people didn't trust Chan according to his past, so they provide Zaotang to him to remind him to say sweet words about them to the Empire.

Boiling is the process of heating the ingredient until all the water escaped and a uniform sticky mixture forms.