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The Chinese New Year, celebrated this year on Feb. 14, is a time of renewal, hope for a prosperous year ahead, and – of course – feasting. The Chinese are known for their healthy diet, but during the New Year festivities, their nutritional choices have a much greater significance than concern for general health.

Fish is the central edible piece of every Chinese New Year celebration. Certain foods are eaten over the course of the 15-day festival, but a whole cooked fish may be presented during dinner on the fourteenth day. There is no common specification as to whether the fish must be eaten or simply displayed, but the head and tail ensure that the next year will be bountiful from beginning to end. The presence of the fish in its entirety symbolizes surpluses in the coming year.

Any dish served or cooked with mandarin oranges symbolizes good fortune. Mandarin oranges are China’s most plentiful fruit, and their name in a certain Chinese dialect is a homophone for “fortune” or “good luck.”

Meals featuring noodles express the hope for longevity, and thus, many more fortunate years to come. Therefore, noodles must be served uncut. Though uncut noodles are traditional in Chinese cuisine and not confined to the New Year’s celebration, their representative qualities are even more powerful at this time.

‘Pot sticker’ dumplings accompany many traditional dishes on the Chinese New Year, and signify an aspiration of luck. The way in which they are prepared, with a ground meat or vegetable filling, symbolizes luck as if it were literally enclosed within the dumplings which are then eaten and good fortune is instilled within the consumer. Their name in Chinese sounds similar to the word used for the earliest paper money, and frying them creates a golden appearance, hence their association with fortune.