Dietary customs of the Mid-Autumn Festival on the 15th day of August in the Han Chinese calendar. Su Dongpo, a great poet in the Song Dynasty, once praised moon cakes with a poem, "A small cake is like chewing the moon, with crisp inside and stuffing inside", which shows that moon cakes in the Song Dynasty already have ghee and sugar stuffing.

In the Yuan Dynasty, it was said that people took advantage of the opportunity of giving mooncakes to carry a note in them, and agreed to take action at the same time to kill and drive away Mongolian "Tatars" on the evening of August 15. In the Ming Dynasty, the custom of eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival became more common. Ming Shenbang's "Wan Bu Miscellaneous Notes" contains: "The furniture of ordinary people's homes is a kind of moon cake with different sizes, which is called moon cake." "Proceedings" said: "In August, Haitang and Hosta flowers were enjoyed in the palace. From the first day of the first lunar month, mooncakes have been sold, and by the fifteenth day, every household has provided mooncakes and melons. If there are still moon cakes left, they should be stored in a dry and cool place and used separately at the end of the year, called reunion cakes. " After the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, the custom of giving away mooncakes on Mid-Autumn Festival became increasingly popular, and mooncakes had the symbolic meaning of "reunion". From Qing Dynasty to modern times, new progress has been made in the quality and variety of moon cakes. Different raw materials, production methods and shapes make moon cakes more colorful, forming Beijing flavor, Suzhou flavor, Guangdong style and other unique varieties. Moon cakes are not only unique holiday food, but also exquisite cakes available in all seasons, which are deeply loved by people.

The word moon cake was first seen in Liang Lumeng by Wu in the Southern Song Dynasty. At that time, moon cakes were diamond-shaped, coexisting with chrysanthemum cakes, plum cakes and five-kernel cakes, and they were "available at any time, on call, and did not miss customers". It can be seen that moon cakes at this time are not only eaten during the Mid-Autumn Festival. As for the origin of the word moon cake, there is no textual research. However, Su Dongpo, a famous scholar in the Northern Song Dynasty, left a poem "Little cakes are like chewing the moon, and there is fullness in the crisp", which may be the origin of the name of moon cakes and the basis of their practice.