Why aren't these agricultural products on the dining table?
These days, when people talk about safe food, they always carry a feeling of staying away from food and worrying about food. They have also begun to notice that the relationship between people and food is changing; in the previous generation, the relationship between people and food was one of cherishing and contentment, that attitude of not wasting when things were scarce, and perhaps food was also much safer in that era. This generation has gradually become rich and abundant, and once there is abundance, they pick and choose carefully, then begin to fear food, dreading that some foods contain drug residues, and calculating which foods are truly best for the body.
From the era of eating in front of the television to now paying attention to running the family dining table; but if at the dining table one is being picky about the nobility of ingredients and afraid that food will make one fat, so that the chopsticks do not move, then a dining table eaten unhappily is better off moved back in front of the television to eat happily.
With plenty of food and clothing, which meal do you remember? A meal that left a deep impression on you~
The first meal of a small family~
Thinking back ten years, with only a newly bought rice cooker and a pot, a home began. I used them to cook a meal. The house was still a messy construction site, and the two of us ate this meal on a wooden plank, while after I finished eating, the child sucked the breast milk that was secreted. A meal after sweating from labor, mixed with dreams of home, just simple cabbage and white rice, yet so deeply unforgettable. And now when I think of it, it seems I never considered that there was a convenient fast-food restaurant right at the mouth of the alley; I was very insistent on wanting to cook a meal, but I also cherished that kitchen life that began under such circumstances.
A picnic by the sea~
I heard of a mother from Orchid Island who often recalls a time in her childhood when she ate with her family.
That was an impoverished era. When mealtime came, there were only cooked sweet potatoes in the pot, with no fish soup and no vegetables. The children looked at the sweet potatoes somewhat disappointedly. Seeing the expressions on the children's faces, this Orchid Island mother immediately thought: "Let's go, we'll eat by the sea." Hearing this, the children's eyes all lit up. So the mother wrapped the sweet potatoes in taro leaves and brought the children to the seaside, sat on the rocks and began eating the sweet potatoes, then she walked among the reef rocks and picked fresh green seaweed for the children to eat with the sweet potatoes. This simple, meager meal by the sea was deeply imprinted in their minds~. Hearing the story, I too was deeply moved by this Orchid Island mother, who has now become a great-grandmother.
A big pot of noodles that steadied people's hearts after the earthquake~
My dad sometimes also brings up the big pot of noodles eaten in a mountain tribal village.
That was shortly after the 921 earthquake occurred. My dad went with a foundation's rescue team into Nantou, stopping and going along the way until the vehicle could no longer move forward. They began walking, carrying relief supplies into a Bunun tribal village. On the way they occasionally saw a cluster of flies gathered on a mound of earth. A companion said, how come there are so many flies, but everyone silently knew in their hearts that beneath the mound of earth was a body of a life that had passed away. When they arrived on foot, it was already late, and the indigenous friends, lacking cooking utensils, lit a fire and directly set a large iron barrel over it, boiling a big pot of noodles for everyone to eat. That night they ate their fill and people's hearts were warmed, whether they were the helpers or the helped.
This meal was also not at a dining table, and there was nothing that could be called very good ingredients, and it was even cooked in a large iron barrel, but the taste of the big iron barrel noodles makes my dad recall it again and again.
Sometimes when occasionally going camping in the mountains, using an old gas stove to simmer a pot of rice. The simple process of waiting to cook a pot of rice, carefully watching the rice cook and waiting for the rice fragrance to steam out, no matter what the meal is, it is always delicious and enchanting. Anticipation and full joy toward food are the beauty of eating and drinking, and in waiting and simplicity it seems all the more able to draw out one's emotion toward food.
Whether the food on the plate is abundant or simple, emotion is the best seasoning; the best and most beautiful meal that one recalls again and again in life is always combined with the emotion of the moment.
Coffee shops especially need emotional seasoning. A cup of bitter coffee accompanies the taste of life, and a cup of sweet coffee is also enjoying the taste of life; if coffee is stripped of emotion, then it is probably no different from a bowl of decocted medicine!
Food at first provides nourishment, and food ultimately provides emotion; besides being grateful for and cherishing food, look sincerely at the production and enjoyment of food. Food is not divided into noble and humble; a small cucumber and an abalone are both food, and the mood of cherishing and enjoying a small cucumber and the mood of tasting an abalone should be equally important.
