The taste of mom, the taste of home.

by dffr3042 on 2009-12-03 13:30:43

The Spring Festival outside the eyes of Chinese people, its importance will not be less than Christmas in the West. At least, it is equally one of the most important reasons to return home. And when this Spring Festival comes along with the end of the year, the way back home becomes even more urgent and resolute. For many people, the taste of home often equals the taste of the dishes made by mom —— perhaps very ordinary, or quite common, but with enough appeal to "lure" people flying home from afar.

Almost every child in every family says that their mom's cooking is the best, especially those wanderers far away, or those who miss their mother deeply because she has passed away. In fact, mom's dishes are just familiar tastes you are used to, not necessarily delicious in an absolute sense. When I was a kid, I kept hearing a classmate talk about how good her mom's cooking was, but when I finally went to her house to try it, I was completely disappointed.

My mom wasn't a great cook either. When she was young, she had too many children to take care of and didn't have time to learn. After having her last child, me, she joined a publishing house and became a working mother, leaving home early and coming back late. So, the meals at our home were mostly prepared by the nanny. When the "Cultural Revolution" began, the nanny left our house, and the task of cooking was handed over to the older children. Mom never got the chance to practice and improve.

However, mom did have one signature dish —— braised eggplant. How it became her preserved repertoire is unknown. From a young age, I liked watching people cook in the kitchen. I watched as mom broke the eggplants into segments, cutting a cross on the flat side with a small knife. Then, she would heat oil in the pan, add ginger slices, and place the eggplant segments in. The heat was turned down very low, and the lid was placed on top to steam them. When the eggplants softened and changed color, she added soy sauce and brown sugar, continuing to stir-fry without adding water until the eggplants were completely soft and tender. The eggplants mom patiently cooked were fragrant, sweet, and very appetizing, becoming my unforgettable "mom's flavor". After mom passed away, every time I see purple eggplants in the supermarket, I can't help but see mom's face and smell the aroma of braised eggplants.

Interestingly, although mom couldn't cook well, she could slaughter chickens. It was said that dad forced her to do it because he himself was afraid and dared not. As a child, I often saw mom on the balcony, scolding dad loudly while wielding the knife to slaughter the chicken. She would first catch the unlucky chicken, pinch its mouth shut, bend its head backward to the neck, clean the large feathers on the back of the neck, then sharpen the cleaver on the whetstone with a "clang clang", and cut swiftly. Before the blood ran out, she would place a chopstick in the chicken's mouth, stand behind a big bowl, and watch carefully as the blood dripped into the bowl containing salted water. After the blood coagulated, mom would instruct me to stir it up so it wouldn't clot. The chicken blood would then be pressed under something heavy to make it "transparent", and finally boiled in hot water to pluck the remaining feathers.

In comparison, I am not as brave as mom, and I have never successfully slaughtered a live chicken. However, I do have a few signature dishes that have taken root in my children's memories. Sometimes they cannot find the right ingredients abroad, or sometimes the dishes they make themselves don't taste like they remember. They cry and feel homesick. Just like the simple pork chops, I marinate them with soy sauce, brown sugar, and black pepper powder, then fry them after coating them with cornstarch; my children can't replicate it well, but they crave that taste desperately. Over the phone, they jump around saying, "It's this, this —— mom's flavor!"

Article source: http://www.jiqingshipin.info