Childhood Essay
Food Memory
The sound of sizzling coming from the kitchen, the clang of the Chinese turner clicking against the iron wok. First, the pure aroma of fresh, fragrant, white Japanese rice reaches me, closely followed by the smell of my grandmother’s extraordinary homemade tomato sauce. The bouquet rushes through the little gaps of my broken wooden window as I learn how to write, and I instantly know what is cooking downstairs. It is my old grandmother cooking her signature dish, “Omurice”.
The unique smell of omurice no longer appears in my beautifully furnished modern home. But it exists only in my dreams as a food memory that I will always remember vividly. Persistent researchers, including me, constantly ask the older generation for the recipe for good omurice, but the process seems futile; that taste of nostalgia is impossible to replicate.
Omurice is a contemporary Japanese fusion cuisine that comprises of fried Japanese white rice in a tomato based sauce, wrapped in an omelet, usually topped with ketchup. It has been around for decades, ever since the Japanese occupation of Taiwan in World War 2. Japanese culture had influenced many Taiwanese who grew up during that period, including my grandmother.
I grew up in the old village near Hsinchu, a very small district at the northern part of Taiwan. My grandparents brought me up with their knowledge of Japanese culture. During that time, getting a good meal had always been an issue for villages in that area; you would hardly ever see grains of white rice in many families. Villagers would often boil tapioca congee for their meals instead of steaming white, plain rice to fill their stomachs. Despite my family being slightly wealthier among the villagers, the standard of living was really tough.
I remember the backyard of my house, where we grew and cultivated tomatoes. The tomatoes we grew were unlike the ones we see in modern supermarkets. Chemical fertilization was not well developed at the time, and usually
The sound of sizzling coming from the kitchen, the clang of the Chinese turner clicking against the iron wok. First, the pure aroma of fresh, fragrant, white Japanese rice reaches me, closely followed by the smell of my grandmother’s extraordinary homemade tomato sauce. The bouquet rushes through the little gaps of my broken wooden window as I learn how to write, and I instantly know what is cooking downstairs. It is my old grandmother cooking her signature dish, “Omurice”.
The unique smell of omurice no longer appears in my beautifully furnished modern home. But it exists only in my dreams as a food memory that I will always remember vividly. Persistent researchers, including me, constantly ask the older generation for the recipe for good omurice, but the process seems futile; that taste of nostalgia is impossible to replicate.
Omurice is a contemporary Japanese fusion cuisine that comprises of fried Japanese white rice in a tomato based sauce, wrapped in an omelet, usually topped with ketchup. It has been around for decades, ever since the Japanese occupation of Taiwan in World War 2. Japanese culture had influenced many Taiwanese who grew up during that period, including my grandmother.
I grew up in the old village near Hsinchu, a very small district at the northern part of Taiwan. My grandparents brought me up with their knowledge of Japanese culture. During that time, getting a good meal had always been an issue for villages in that area; you would hardly ever see grains of white rice in many families. Villagers would often boil tapioca congee for their meals instead of steaming white, plain rice to fill their stomachs. Despite my family being slightly wealthier among the villagers, the standard of living was really tough.
I remember the backyard of my house, where we grew and cultivated tomatoes. The tomatoes we grew were unlike the ones we see in modern supermarkets. Chemical fertilization was not well developed at the time, and usually