Another recipe
2010 August 7
I’m on a bit of a blog sabbatical. I’ve got a lot of stuff to say, but none of it is coming out quite right yet, so I’m putting it on hold.
In the meantime, here’s another Flavor Bible recipe for you, cobbled together via random shit left in my pantry:
Salmon with Cardamom, and a Bunch of Stir-Fried Shit on the Side
The salmon part
- You get some salmon. I like a lot of salmon.
- You slather the salmon in something spicy. I like Sambal Oelek.
- Now you slather it with cardamom.
- Put the salmon in a baking dish. Pour over it either a) a can or two of pineapple chunks, with juice, b) a can or two of mandarin oranges, with juice, or c) some orange juice or pineapple juice.
- Put the salmon dish in the fridge to baste while you prepare the other stuff
- Eventually, put the salmon in the oven somewhere between 350-450. I don’t know what temperature you’re supposed to cook salmon at. Don’t ask me about this part. It’ll cook eventually.
- During the last ten minutes of cooking, sprinkle some coconut on top of the salmon and let it get crispy.
The stir-fry part
- Slice a yam into thin bits. Two yams if you have company
- Get some baby carrots if you like a really carrot-y taste and have extra time to stir-fry, or shredded carrots if you like a little less carrot flavor or have less time. The shredded carrots have a really nice consistency at the end.
- Mix the yam and carrots together in a bowl with honey, brown sugar, ginger, maybe a little lemon juice, maybe some cinnamon, and a splash of sesame oil (can substitute olive oil if you don’t want to go get special-ass oils).
- Stir-fry the yam and carrots mixture. Possibly add: a) some rice vinegar for tanginess or b) some soy sauce for saltiness, so you can get a whole sweet-sour-salty thing going on.
- When the yams are getting there, throw in some snow peas.
- When the snow peas are getting there, throw in some chopped up scallions and (optional) sesame seeds. They’re good for your cholesterol, is the thing, so put some in your face.
- I found that while cooking this, it smelled unappetizing. So don’t be surprised. It tastes good, though.
- Serve over rice.
For dessert: rice pudding, coconut cookie, and a slice of ginger candy.
Bonus: While cooking, send your partner/roommate/friend/stranger to your local Asian market. Have them pick out several refreshments that they do not know the names of and do not recognize at all. Drink with meal.
5 Responses
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Dear Harriet,
I’m 15 years old and I like your blog a lot. As an Asian American girl, your posts about racism and sexism are meaningful to me; before I started reading your blog, I knew rape jokes and racist comments were wrong, but I didn’t have the words to explain why or how. Now when somebody tries to give me B.S. about how they were just making a joke, I can tell them explain to them exactly how bigoted they’re being. I appreciate that a lot. Through your blog, I’ve also begun to examine my own prejudices too. I used to be transphobic, but now I’m learning about trans issues and trying to be as educated as possible. You are one of my heroes and when I’m older I hope I can write like you.
So I was pretty disappointed when I read this post and I saw your last sentences. People are always telling me that they can’t pronounce my Korean name or that it’s weird. When I talk about the food and beverages that I eat and drink at home, people always act like they’re mysterious strange things from another planet, something strange and unrecognizable. Sometimes I’ll offer them a soda labeled in a different language and they’ll act like they’re brave adventurers trying a taste of the “exotic orient”. If I was your friend and you were making salmon for me, and you sent me out to the Korean market, I would be able to read the labels. And I wouldn’t think any beverages were weird. I think that this is called “othering” or “exoticification”. And it makes me think that maybe you didn’t consider the possibility of having Asian friends too.
Which makes me sad, because I would like to be friends with people like you.
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: I’m sorry this offended you. I specifically avoided calling these refreshments weird, or strange, because I don’t think they are — they’re new and different to me, but that doesn’t make them weird or strange. I like to try them particularly because they’re new and different to me, and I want to find new things that I like. I don’t have a lot of luck finding new foods at big box grocery stores, so I visit the local ethnic grocery stores whenever I want to try something new to me.
That’s why I stated that I would ask somebody to find something they do not know and do not recognize, which is very different, to me, than asking somebody to pick the weirdest thing they can from the weird food store, because all that Asian food is so wacky. It does imply that I don’t have a lot of friends for whom the stuff in an ethnic grocery store wouldn’t be different or unrecognizable, and you’d be right about that. My whiteness was showing there, and it was problematic for me to discuss that as a generalized experience. It’s also problematic that ethnic food is often new and different to me, because it reflects upon the bubble I live in and what efforts I’ve made to break out of it.
But I want to differentiate that from the experience of talking about the food I want to eat or want to try. I can’t try new and different food without its newness and differentness being an ample part of the experience for me, and often something exciting or enjoyable. The fact that a food is exotic to me the first time I try it — or the fact of searching out something specifically because it is exotic to me — doesn’t necessarily mean I’m exoticizing it. To me, exoticizing something comes from discussing it as if my audience is only white and has also never tried this food without making that an explicit, stated part of what I’m saying. That is what I did here; my friends are white, and this food is exotic to them as well, and sharing that with them and others is an enjoyable part of my dinner for me, but I didn’t state that outright, and wrote as though that was an assumed, default given.
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I like Yeo’s Soya Bean Drink in a can. I drink lots of soymilk normally but this stuff is extra tasty for some reason.
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Going to do this for the roomies next week and see how it goes.
I am in the middle of building a gastropub menu and am testing out new stuff as often as I can.
Don’t worry. You’ll get all the credit
-Tony
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Wait, did someone thumbs-down a comment about liking a soft drink?
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