Only love and food can't live up to

In my memory, a large part is about my childhood hometown. I spent most of my childhood in the country with my grandmother. Until now, I think that is the best memory of my life. When I grow up, I have been to countless places, from small towns to big cities. Often think of, often eager to go back, especially when I can't sleep at night. The local flavor in those memories gave me the courage to go on. I often miss it, often have the impulse to write something, but often dare not remember the past that I can't go back, and stay in my memory like a dream, like an ideal country I made up.

Speaking of hometown, there is fragrance, and every hometown has a special taste, which is unique and irreplaceable. What I miss is the smell coming from grandma's yard at that time, mixed with the smoky smell of firewood, the full smell of food from green to mature, the earthy smell in the air, and the pickled smell in the pickle jar. The food on the table can't be tasted anywhere except the small courtyard.

1. Pancake

Pot cakes are the specialty of the town. Every year on the morning of New Year's Eve, my grandparents will prepare frying pan cakes. Grandpa took out the shiny pork head and cut it into small pieces. I kept yelling, "I don't want to get fat." Grandpa always picks up the fattest piece and brings it to my eyes. I put a smile in my mouth and told me that "the fattest one smells the best". The old tofu made in advance was detained in a basket by grandma. This old tofu was ground by her own family. It's rough but full of fragrance. It is cut into small squares, which are hard and won't come loose.

When grandpa prepared the ingredients, grandma began to mix the dough, and the snow-white dough was turned under grandma's hand until it became flexible and moderate. The white dough magically changed from grandma's hand to a big cake. Grandpa took the big cake from grandma, put it in the cauldron and began to bake it. The cake ripens slowly in the sound of bellows, giving off a fragrance. The baked cake is as thin as paper.

Grandpa stepped on the edge of the stove with one foot, frying cakes in the cauldron with his strength and sprinkling oil on the bottom of the cauldron. He first fried the pig's head, sprinkled it with old tofu, and grandma used bellows to add firewood to control the fire. The aroma of pig's head and old tofu slowly bubbles out in the process of heating and stirring. Finally, he sprinkled chopped coriander and stir-fried it a few times to make the aroma more intense. Grandpa wrapped the fried stuffing in the cake, rolled it up and sealed it. When everything is cut in half, the pot cake is ready. Pig's head and old tofu leaked from the incision. The green parsley block looked so good that I couldn't wait to take a bite. My mouth is full of fragrance.

2. Winter melon scalds bread

I can't eat melon and hot bread anywhere else. I often miss this smell when I grow up and leave my hometown. When I go home on holiday, my grandparents know that I love this, and they will prepare the ingredients in advance and make them specially for me.

In late summer and early autumn, when winter melon grows, every winter melon is wrapped in frost, fresh and lovely. Grandpa carefully peeled off the skin of wax gourd, which turned into a naked doll. He dug out the seeds and cut them into small pieces, and the pieces of diced wax gourd glistened. Dice pork and marinate it with soy sauce, salt, onion, ginger and garlic in advance. It will taste after a long time. Grandpa knows that I don't like fat meat, so he always cuts lean meat and marinates it.

Grandma scooped a spoonful of flour into the basin, poured it on the flour bit by bit with boiling water, and stirred it with chopsticks while pouring it, so that the flour could form small dough one by one. That's how the so-called "hot bread" comes from. The buns made in this way are tough and won't break. Knead the small dough into a big dough, then roll it into a thin steamed bun skin, two spoonfuls of melon and one spoonful of diced meat, and knead it obliquely, and a steamed bun will be thin.

Add water to the firewood cauldron, fill a whole cage, cover the mat, pull up the bellows, and soon the steaming aroma of steamed bread begins to diffuse. Grandma will buckle several bowls on the cover mat and put water at the bottom of the bowls. When the water is hot, steamed buns can be cooked. Mature winter melon steamed stuffed bun is shiny, and the skin of steamed stuffed bun is shiny. You can see the wax gourd and diced meat inside. Eat a mouthful of full soup, and the smell of wax gourd is thick. At this time, with the tea poured from grandma's old teapot, it is simply the most pleasant taste in the world.

3. Wild vegetable Balazi

At the end of March and the beginning of April, wild vegetables filled the fields like crazy. Ququ, mother-in-law, wild shepherd's purse … they were full of spring rain and grew rapidly. This season is like cotton candy, sweet, light, soft, warm, not in a hurry, soft and melting in the sun. It seems that the endless wine in winter is scattered in the soil, and the whole world is drunk. The wind is swaying, and there is a poetry in the air.

I like this season very much. Wild vegetables are the best gifts for the whole spring. Putting on grandma's black cloth shoes, carrying a wicker basket in her left hand and a sickle in her right hand is exciting. The new weeds and wild vegetables in the field covered all the hay with green, and the old woman floated on the ground with clusters of yellow flowers and fell down with a sickle. "Ququ cuisine" is what we call it there. Its scientific name is "chicory", which is a kind of wild vegetable often eaten in spring. It can be eaten raw with dipping sauce, and it is crisp and bitter to chew. Wild shepherd's purse is probably the last dish I know. I don't know why, but I can't recognize it. Shepherd's purse is best for jiaozi. In spring, the sun is a bit dazzling, and wild vegetables grow unscrupulously in the spring breeze like shining golden light.

I rushed home with a basket of wild vegetables and showed my grandpa my achievements like a baby. When I get a compliment, I am very happy. Calling grandma "Balazi" is a rustic name, but that "ba" still needs to be pronounced in four tones. I have never seen this kind of food anywhere except my hometown. Grandma chooses wild vegetables, washes them, roughly cuts them with a knife, spreads flour evenly on the wild vegetables, so that each leaf is stained with thin flour, sprinkled with salt and sesame oil, stirred evenly and steamed in a pot. Grandma said that this kind of rice used to be eaten by the poor. At that time, there was a lack of food, and all of them were mixed with wild vegetables. There was no white flour before, and all we ate was corn flour.

When Balazi came out of the pot, the green wild vegetables became a little black under the high temperature cooking. Flour is soaked in water and wrapped in crystal clear wild vegetables. In the steaming, the fragrance of wild vegetables was soaked out. Pick up one and throw it into your mouth, and the bitter taste of grass will spread out. Under the embellishment of salt and sesame oil, the whole food presents a bright taste in your mouth. This is my favorite dish. I think the taste of spring is like this.

Steamed rice cake

The rice cakes in the north are different from those in the south. I didn't know there were different rice cakes until I went to college and left my hometown. Steaming rice cakes is carried out in winter, and the flour ground from corn and rice is tough and powerful. Corn rice, also known as sorghum rice, is planted in every household. When I was a child, I liked the full ears of sorghum best. The tall pole is bent by the ear, not as petty as the wheat seedling, nor as low-key as the corn in the air. Red sorghum ears are full of success.

In winter, grandma takes a dustpan to hold red dates, which are all made in the jujube garden behind the house. In spring, jujube trees are full of rain, and in autumn, red fruits are hung all over the treetops. Grandma took a small bench and sat in the sun and carefully selected it. Throw away those with worms in their eyes and those who are not full, and the rest are the "elites" in these red dates. When the water is full, the jujube is cooked in the pot, and the aroma of jujube is slowly emitted from the hot air, which is sweet and greasy. I love the smell, but the aroma of jujube is better than eating it. Take out the cooked red dates and put them in a bowl. I couldn't help stealing them one by one. My grandmother scolded me as soon as she turned around and found me stealing. I ran away with a smile, and then I stole another one. The corn rice was filled with water and huddled under grandma's hand. The yellow and tender rice balls were pulled into small glutinous rice balls, which turned round and round in the shape of a wowotou, pressing red dates, and a small tower-like rice cake sat there steadily. Clay stove, firewood hot pot, big bellows, so the steamed rice cake is very practical and safe to eat. Take a bite, waxy, with the fragrance of corn and the rich sweetness of red dates.

In winter, every family steamed rice cakes, put them neatly in a big jar in the yard, freeze them overnight, and then take them out while they are hot at any time. At that time, rice cakes were also food that neighbors could share. Whoever steamed it, he gave it to several neighbors and held it happily. A few days later, he steamed it in his own house and gave it to others. In winter, rice cakes are firmly packed in vats, just like Chinese cabbage lying in a vegetable cellar. This winter seems to be very secure and satisfied.

The smells in those memories will always rise in my mind from time to time. They are just like that small village, lying there quietly and steadily. I wandered around for a long time, only to find that it was a past that I could never go back. Grandpa stayed in spring forever, and grandma's legs walked slower and slower. The yard with vines and figs just sat there quietly, but it also bent down and lost a lot of weight. The taste that I want to remember but dare not remember is getting farther and farther on my wandering track, but many flavors brought by life can't cover up the flavor they left me. I think I am eager to let them accompany me to wander step by step. ...

Link to the joint essay on "Food, Peace Talks and Love":

/p/b98a8300b94a