七草がゆ Seven vege rice porrige

今日は1月7日、日本では七草[ななくさ]がゆを食べる習慣[しゅうかん]があります。かゆはRice porridgeで日本や中国でよく食べますが、1月7日はかゆに七草を入れて七草がゆにして食べます。

もともとは、魔[]よけの意味があったそうですが、現在はお正月にごちそうを食べすぎて、胃[い]が疲[つか]れているから、消化[しょうか]しやすいものを食べて体を大切にしようという意味になっているようです。七草はその名の通り、7つの野菜[やさい]の意味で、うち1つは大根[だいこん]です。今日、日本ではどこのスーパーでも多分「七草がゆセット」という7つの野菜がパックされたものが売られていることでしょう。
 
It’s the 7th of January today. Japanese people have a custom to eat Seven vege rice porridge today. Japanese and also Chinese people eat rice porridge all year around, but today, on the 7th of January, Japanese people add “seven vege” to it and make special Seven vege rice porridge.
 
Originally people ate it to keep evil spirits away but nowadays people eat it believing that it is good for our health since we have kept eating all sort of feast for the New Year (you know, this dish has only rice and veges). If you go to any supermarkets in Japan today, you could find a product called something like “Seven vege rice porridge package” which contains all of those special seven vegetables (perhaps plus rice as well, but there is no difficulty to buy rice anytime). I won’t list those veges here as I do not know how they are called in English, but one of them is just ordinary vege, which is white radish. Since I am here in New Zealand and have not had feast for the New Year, my stomach is okay without this porridge, but I miss it a bit. It’s funny, this is just rice porridge and it does not specially taste nice or anything, but when it is out of reach, it often makes you miss it!

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