The origins of Misua noodles
Legend of Misua:
According to legend, the noodles are a carefully prepared gift from the "Dark Lady of the Nine Heavens", the beloved daughter of the "Queen Mother of the West", to celebrate her mother's birthday, which is why they are called "Shou Mian" (birthday/longevity noodles).
Legend has it that the noodles were created under the guidance of the “Dark Lady of the Nine Heavens”, which is why noodle makers often enshrine the statue of the “Dark Lady”. There are even a pair of couplets praising the noodles: the left couplet says "golden shuttle and jade silk", the right couplets says "silk like pulling threads" and horizontally " stellar craftsmanship".
About the origins of Misua noodles:
The earliest records of Misua noodles called them Shui-Sou Mian (water-soaked noodles) or Zhu-Bing (boiled cakes) in the Eastern Han Dynasty, Tang-Bing (hot water cakes) in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, Shui-Yin (water Yin) or Hutou in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Lengtao in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, and Wentao in the Ming Dynasty. These ancient names correspond to modern cold noodles or boiled noodles. When did the Chinese start eating noodles? It may have originated from sacrificial activities and later became a traditional cuisine. In the Yuan Dynasty, “silver noodles” were eaten on birthdays, and the custom of eating noodles on birthdays has continued to this day. The “Changshou Mian” (longevity noodles) of the past were commonly known as “Misua” or “longevity noodles” (“thin noodles” and “longevity noodles” are pronounced the same in the Fuzhou dialect, so Misua is also called “longevity noodles”).
Misua noodles can be roughly divided into these factions:
Zhangzhou (near Xiamen and Shantou in Fujian province)
Quanzhou (also known as Licheng, Citongcheng, and Wenling in Fujian province, located on the southeast coast of Fujian)
Fuzhou (the lower reaches of the Minjiang River and the coastal areas in eastern Fujian Province, the largest city in Fujian)
All three schools belong to the southern school of mainland China, including Zhangzhou and Quanzhou, which use the same method of production; in the northern part of the mainland there is another faction that call the noodles Gua-mian (hanged noodles). Misua was introduced to Taiwan during the Qing Dynasty, and since both the Zhangzhou and Quanzhou factions first came to settle in Taiwan, their Misua is called "local noodles" in Taiwan. The ancestors of the Fuzhou people came to Taiwan later to farm. Therefore, the Fuzhou noodles brought by the immigrants were called "Fuzhou Misua" by the already settled Zhang-Quan people.