Passion in the Kitchen

By Li Ge

In her new book, Kitchen,Banana Yoshimoto writes in the preface: “My favorite place in this world is the kitchen.No matter where I am and what I'm doing, as long as there is a kitchen where I can make food,I won't find it unbearable. Of course, it's even better if the kitchen is equipped with utensils and appliances I like, as well as clean rags and shiny white tiles.In this case, even if I'm the only person left in the world, I'll find peace and quiet in my kitchen.”

I have many girlfriends who like to stay at home in their spare time and clean their room until it sparkles and shines. They follow gourmet accounts on Weibo and other social media sites, subscribe to electronic cooking publications, and make delicious food in accordance with baking recipes and private secrets from the many books and posts they read. Delicious food set carefully on exquisite plates and served with fine cutlery help to make a beautiful and cozy home. It is interesting to visit their kitchens, where in addition to the common appliances like rice cookers and microwave ovens, you'll see other interesting appliances: egg cookers, coffee makers, small ovens, sandwich makers, and others. If you open their cute mini-cabinets, you'll be amazed by the variety of spices and seasonings stored there.One of my friend's places is literally the Japanese minimalist style portrayed in Rayli Home Magazine. When I visit her home,I'm always impressed by those subtle details—such as light milk to go with coffee instead of nondairy creamer, brown sugar instead of white sugar.

I have another friend who works in the media. Her biggest hobby is cooking, which is a family tradition, since both her parents are cooking masters.Other than visiting online shops regularly to check out all kinds of ingredients, she makes time to visit local food markets on her business trips. As a matter of fact,her colleagues will sometimes conduct work meetings at her house, talking about work over delicious dinner cooked with secret family recipes. Writing is a solitary and lonely job, and good food and fine drink give it warmth and coziness. I guess that's why her words are also warm, lively and full of vitality, like a person with a full stomach.

There is another friend,who had always eaten in the school's canteen until she went abroad for her doctorate. She began to cook on this foreign land, thousands of miles away from home, because food now became the closest thing to her homeland. She went to a local church every weekend because she could eat Chinese dishes cooked and distributed there after service. In such gatherings people can make new friends and eat everyone's specialty dishes together. The banging of chicken being chopped, the popping of ginger being smashed, and the sizzling of hot oil… It feels like all these various beautiful sounds activate the souls of food, as well as people. On this cold, strange and foreign land, one bite of hot,familiar, delicious homemade food brings home to you. As Isabel Allende said in A Memoir of the Senses, “All memories can be traced back to our senses.”Overseas students usually have the same enthusiasm for cooking as they have for their study. I have seen my friend's true talent.As a biology student, he used his professional knowledge and practical spirit, experimenting until he finally came up with authentic soup concentration made by hand with dried mushrooms.

There are also many culinary enthusiasts who have acquired their cooking skills later in life, who were transformed by marriage and children. Many female friends of mine have become totally different after getting married. They might have never entered kitchen before marriage, yet when they gain the title of “wife,” they are not tired of cooking three meals per day in their kitchen. When we fall in love with someone, we tend to accommodate their taste,consider their eating habits,understand their body, and rack our brains for a bigger variety of meals, so as to let our beloved eat happily and comfortably.So cooking becomes a way to show deep and considerate love.I once read a story written by a housewife writer, who serves different homemade jams in the morning and different green vegetables in the evening. She even prepares a simple pickled radish to satisfy her foodie husband's taste buds. To her,cooking is the most gentle“husband-taming technique.”Think about it, when she has raised her husband's taste buds to such a high expectation, what kind of woman other than herself could meet his requirements?In addition to love between men and women, cooking is also about maternal love. I have a girlfriend who gets up very early every day to cook for her son so that every morning the child can have a homemade breakfast, which amazed us all.

People who love to cook are often good at making decorations with ingredients at hand, which creates little surprises and joys in life. Wang Zengqi once mentioned many of those little creative lowcost low-carbon decorations in his book, such as radish garlic:“Prepare a big radish and cut its tail and head, hollow out the center, then bury a garlic inside.When the garlic leaves grow green and the radish sprouts turn pink,the vitality is pleasant and the visual is cheering in winter time.”

Though I fully understand the principle of “the best way to grasp a man's heart is to grab his stomach,” I actually don't cook. Yet I married a man who is enthusiastic about cooking. My husband said that his happiest moment in life is making a stew in the kitchen while reading a book and chatting with me. He finds cooking fun and always enjoys trying new recipes or improving existing products. Men's cooking is usually rough—for example,my husband forever cooks his chicken in huge chunks. When we were still dating, he cooked for Valentine's Day. He made chicken stew for me with green radish,and he gave me the chicken thighs and wings and took the bony parts for himself. Compared to the clothes and cosmetics other girls received, I find a delicious hot meal much more pleasing and delightful. (From Sometimes in Silence, Sometimes in Words,Jiangsu Literature and Art Publishing House. Translation:Lu Qiongyao)