Chicago gets ready to celebrate Lunar New Year this weekend

Chicago celebrates Lunar New Year with food, gifts and joy

FOX 32's Joanie Lum takes a trip to 88 Marketplace in Chinatown as Chicago celebrates the Lunar New Year.

CHICAGO - Preparations are underway for the Lunar New Year at 88 Marketplace in Chinatown, where shoppers find groceries, decorations and things to bring in good luck.

It’s the Year of the Rabbit in the Lunar New Year calendar. The color red is everywhere: lanterns, candies and red envelopes filled with money are given to children and young single adults. 

Families will gather to share dinners that include symbolic foods like fish, which represents abundance. Other foods such as dumplings and oranges represent money or prosperity. 

Tradition also dictates that the house should be clean to welcome company. But according to superstition, do not clean on the actual new year, which is Sunday, or you will sweep away the good luck.

Celebrating Chinese New Year with dumplings from 'Dumpling Daughter' cookbook

It is tradition to eat dumplings within the first 14 days of Chinese New Year because the represent "money bags" or wealth. Dumpling Daughter author Nadia Liu Spellman and her mother show how to make dumplings from scratch.

Even the name 88 Marketplace represents fortune. In Chinese culture, eights are lucky.

The relatively new store is Chicago's largest Chinese supermarket. It's located at 2105 S. Jefferson.