by Tie Ning
They reluctantly said goodbye to each other. Although Youyou lived in Building Number 2, the same one as Chen Zai, only four buildings away from Tiao, they still felt reluctant to part, a feeling that Tiao would never again experience with a friend in her life.
Youyou was going to give a dinner party. One day early in winter, after school, she invited Tiao to come to a banquet at her house on Sunday. She chose Sunday because she would be the only one home. Her parents were in the Reed River Farm, like Tiao’s father. Normally, her grandmother stayed with her, but Youyou’s aunt had recently given birth to a child and her grandma had gone to look after the baby, so Youyou was the only one left at home.
She was happy to stay home alone; first of all, she didn’t have to answer her grandma’s gabby, irrelevant questions. Grandma loved to listen to the radio, but she often misunderstood what was on it. The radio always broadcast the news of whom the great leader had just met, and that “the meeting took place in a cordial and friendly atmosphere.” Grandma would ask, “Youyou, how come this cordial and friendly meeting only lasted for seven minutes?” She also mistook Nixon for “onion” and said, “Youyou, how come they call a big shot like him an onion?” Now that Grandma was away, Youyou, with her intense devotion, could take over the kitchen.
People’s food back then was simple and boring, so their kitchens were bare and basic. Although born with a passion for food, Youyou hadn’t seen much by way of gourmet cooking, nor did she have much money. But even with a single yuan in her pocket, she had the confidence to invite friends for dinner.
She spent fifty cents to buy a piece of streaky pork. She sliced off the skin and cooked it on a low heat for several hours. When the skin quivered and turned fluffy and soft and the juice thickened, Youyou added soy sauce and chopped spring onions, set it aside to cool and congeal, and she had jelly from pork skin, a dish called pork skin aspic—done. She then diced the fatty pork, coated it in flour batter, and fried it in oil (the diced pork burned because there was not enough oil), and the fried crystal pork was done. To be eaten dipped in salt and pepper.
She fished out some dried wood-ear mushrooms and daylily buds from the kitchen cabinet, soaked them open, and used leftover pork to make muxi pork—another dish done.
She wanted to serve four dishes and a soup, so she spent two cents on a piece of pressed crabapple cake. She shredded white turnip and sliced the cake. White turnip mixed with red crab-apple cake, delicious even to the eye. She then made a bowl of dried shrimp soup with soy sauce. Now the banquet, for which she had spent a total of fifty-two cents, was complete. Lastly, she grilled a handful of rice noodles on the stove for decoration. This was her own invention and ahead of its time—clear rice noodles that would puff up and whiten after being grilled, nicely crunchy, like the puffed food that would become popular in the eighties.
Tiao came for the banquet and brought Fei along. Youyou felt honoured to have a great beauty like Fei at dinner. She believed the gourmet food she created was intended for someone like her, and only a great beauty was worthy of it.
The three of them sat down to enjoy Youyou’s cooking. At Fei’s suggestion, they even drank some wine, which was really water. When the girls heard that Youyou had spent only fifty-two cents on such a big table of gourmet food, they couldn’t help praising her as a culinary genius, a genius who could turn lead into gold. Fei gulped the wine, gobbled up the pork skin aspic and the turnip, and munched on the crispy rice noodles. She ate and drank until her body slumped and her eyes went hazy. Youyou and Tiao helped her lie down on the bed. She lay on her side with her face propped up on an elbow and said, “Youyou, you have a really nice place, I wouldn’t mind staying here forever.” She looked so pretty at that moment, like a princess or a queen, that Tiao and Youyou, who stood beside the bed, were willing to serve her with all their hearts.
When every scrap of food was gone, they started to discuss the menu for their next banquet. Tiao said, “My dad knows how to do a dessert called grilled miniature snowballs.” Youyou said, “Wait, wait, grilled miniature snowballs? That sounds wonderful. Just by the name I can tell it’s unusual. Who would have imagined? Can snowballs be grilled?” She wanted Tiao to tell her every detail of the recipe for grilled miniature snowballs, but Tiao couldn’t remember it all, so she promised Youyou she would look it up when she got home.
How exciting it would be to make grilled snowballs! It got Tiao enthusiastically searching for old magazines at home. Even though there were not many left, she remembered that when they moved from Beijing, Wu had kept a few copies of the Chinese edition of Soviet Woman, selling or discarding the rest. A magazine that Wu used to subscribe to, Soviet Woman introduced different styles of cooking, knitting, cosmetics and grooming, and fashion. Wu loved the knitting and fashion sections in the magazine—it was where she had found many of her jumper patterns—but had no interest in the food. When a holiday came, it was Yixun who created novelty dishes from the magazines. He successfully made the grilled snowballs, the magic of which Tiao would never forget. She came back to rummage through the books and magazines, taking advantage of Wu’s absence. Wu must have gone to People’s Hospital to see Dr. Tang, but Tiao found herself less concerned about that than she had been. It was definitely not because she’d become more accepting of Dr. Tang, but because she now had her own friends, friendships that were more important to her than the relationship between Wu and Dr. Tang.
She searched for the issues of Soviet Woman at home, and Fan, just back from school, helped her until they finally found them. Tiao knew that to carry around this kind of magazine was illegal, and that it would be subject to confiscation, which was exactly why she experienced the excitement and vigilance of a secret agent. She wrapped the magazines in newspapers, hid them in a big backpack, and then dragged Fan along with her to Youyou’s place.
She came through the door and signalled to Youyou to lock it behind her. Youyou bolted the door and tiptoed to sit beside Tiao, patiently waiting for her to show her the Soviet Woman magazines. Tiao opened the backpack, took one of the illustrated magazines out of the newspaper wrapping, turned to a page, and read aloud, word for word: “Nothing could be better than following your holiday lunch with a delicious, easily digested dessert like grilled miniature snowballs.
“Mix powdered sugar and citric acid into egg white that has been beaten into foam, then dip a soup spoon in cold water, scoop up the egg white batter, one spoonful at a time, and drop into the boiling milk. Don’t let the balls stick together. These balls of egg white and citric acid will then absorb some milk and react chemically with it to form miniature snowballs. Cook the snowballs for three minutes, gently scoop them up with a straining ladle, and then put them in a colander. When the miniature snowballs dry, serve on a plate with syrup. Take care not to let them stick together.
“Syrup: Carefully mix egg yolk and sugar and beat well. Add a soup spoon of flour and pour the batter into boiling milk. Keep stirring as it cooks, until the syrup begins to thicken. Add vanilla, stir, set aside to cool.
“To make miniature snowballs, you’ll need two egg whites, 30 cubic centimetres of sugar powder, 30 cubic centimetres of citric acid, and 200 cubic centimetres of milk. To make the syrup, you’ll need 100 cubic centimetres of milk, 100 cubic centimetres of sugar, and one egg yolk. The quantity of vanilla will vary according to taste.”
What Tiao read aloud struck Youyou with awe. Although many things in the recipe, such as vanilla, citric acid, and sugar powder, were mysterious to her, she had the superior intuition of the world’s gourmets. Her intuition involved her sense of smell, taste, and touch, and allowed her to come to the conclusion that the grilled miniature snowballs must be full of flavour, rich, mellow, and delicious. Her pork skin aspic and fried crystal pork were nothing compared to the snowballs; they were not on the same level—didn’t belong in the same world. But she was not intimidated; she believed she could make the dish. She asked what a cubic centimetre was, and Tiao said one cubic centimetre was a g
ram. Now Youyou became more confident—an experienced chef always pays attention to details. Her other questions concerned where she could find the ingredients. Youyou didn’t drink milk, and there were only egg, sugar, and flour in her house. Tiao said, “That’s no problem. We still have citric acid and vanilla. We also have milk. Fan and I drink half a jin of milk every day, which we can save for snowballs. Doesn’t the magazine say it takes only three hundred cubic centimetres? Three hundred cubic centimetres are three hundred grams, not even a jin, which is five hundred. Fan, what do you think?”
Fan nodded vigorously. She knew contributing half a jin of milk would be worth it, because they would definitely invite her to eat the miniature snowballs.
4
These copies of the Chinese edition of Soviet Woman, slightly dog-eared and hard to put down, were Tiao, Fei, and Youyou’s spiritual food for a long time.
They used Youyou’s house as a stronghold, reading and practicing recipes over and over without getting bored. With Tiao’s help, Youyou successfully made grilled miniature snowballs. When they stood in front of the briquette stove, cheek to cheek, and watched the egg white batter drop into the boiling milk and absorb enough to form the snowballs, they almost wept with excitement. They felt like they had reached a new level, where they were not just displaying craft, but art, great art. They held the spoons, gently placing the snow-white balls, along with light yellow syrup, into their mouths, onto their tongues, letting their tongues surround and taste them. They held their breath to chew and savour. They had a real taste for it. It gave fragrance to their mouths and stomachs and its rich flavour told them life could be very beautiful. Youyou would never go back to cooking those puffed rice noodles and fried crystal pork; her ambition now was to try out all the best recipes in Soviet Woman. Tiao went right along with Youyou’s ambition, generously providing all the ingredients that she could possibly find, items she had hidden from Wu, such as curry powder, cinnamon, bay leaf, whole white pepper, spiced soy sauce, tomato sauce, citric acid, vanilla, etc… . Almost every one of them was put to use at their stronghold for eating and drinking.
They didn’t spend their pocket money anymore; they saved it, one cent at a time. When they had saved enough, they shared the cost of buying fish, meat, fruit, eggs, and sugar. Soviet Woman calmed them, and they no longer minded the indifference of their teachers and classmates, the on-again-off-again classes, and the heavy physical labour—after they entered middle school they often went to dig air-raid shelters, and sometimes mixed dirt and water into moulds for no apparent reason. They would come home muddy and wet. After they washed, they went right to Youyou’s house, where Soviet Woman was waiting.
They studied and then made Armenian grilled pork patties: Mix ground pork, egg yolk, salt, pepper, and chopped onions together and make patties; sprinkle flour on the patties and brush with egg. Then sprinkle bread crumbs on the patties, put them in the oven, and bake for fifteen minutes. Use meat broth to make tomato sauce, according to the recipe as follows: Add tomato sauce to the meat broth and boil. Add MSG, salt, and a little flour or cornstarch. Finally, put the grilled pork patties on a plate and pour the sauce over them. They didn’t have an oven, but Youyou hit on the idea that she could substitute frying for grilling, spreading oil on the patties and using a low flame. They tasted very good.
There were also Tbilisi pickles, Italian wine fish stew, Hungarian cabbage stew, Ukraine red cabbage soup, Cantonese tomato barbecued pork, and Hangzhou barbecued pork. They felt particularly close to the Chinese dishes introduced in Soviet Woman. But for grilled and fried game, they felt totally at sea. Because they had no way to get game, they made fun of the illustrations in the cooking section: a rabbit holds a knife in one hand and a fork in the other, explaining to the readers how to cook and eat delicious game. It was like a person enthusiastically telling others how to kill him and make him as delicious as possible.
Once in a while, they would try to make some snacks: Russian sweet bread, sugar and honey pancake, and curry beef turnover. Some recipes required “marshmallow cream,” and they immediately studied the instructions and searched for the ingredients to make it: cream, gelatine, egg white, sugar, caramel, water, and vanilla. To make marshmallow cream you mix these ingredients together and beat for a long time until it becomes fluffy. Cream, gelatine, and caramel were the things that were most difficult to find, and the stores in Fuan just didn’t sell this kind of stuff. Youyou remembered that the mother of one of her elementary school classmates worked in a food processing factory, so she went to talk to her. Her classmate’s mother said, “Our factory does have these things, but what do you need them for?”
Youyou said, “My grandma is sick and the doctor gave her this folk prescription, which requires only these three things. Just a little, a little bit of each of them.” But even a little cost money. The food processing factory was government-run, so Youyou used her back-door connections and spent a vast sum of money, 1.40 yuan, to buy cream, gelatine, and caramel. She and Tiao took turns beating the mixture, using chopsticks, the way they beat eggs. It was really hard work. When Tiao thought about it years later, she felt that mixing these watery ingredients and beating them into a snow-white, fluffy cream was nothing short of a miracle. She’d kept at it with Youyou’s encouragement. They beat the mixture for almost an hour, until their arms were sore and their vision was blurred, but, at last, they succeeded. The sticky fluid finally turned into fragrant cream! Ah, marshmallow cream!
There was a sumptuous spread in the “Home-Style Kitchen” section that particularly interested Youyou. Actually, it was only a few examples of cold dishes with fruit and vegetables. It read: The dishes you make should be both tasty and attractive. Using ingredients like fresh cucumber, green peas, sliced boiled eggs, green onions, and tomatoes, you can put together an attractive dish. In early autumn, vegetables are abundant, so homemakers can easily prepare a variety of delicious and appealing dishes.
Below are recipes from Vladimir Lepushin, head chef of Moscow’s Metropol Hotel.
1. Festive Appetizer (Cold Dish): First, cut cooked wild fowl into thin slices, and then take fresh potatoes, green peas, cauliflower, and celery stalks, and dice after boiling. Thinly slice both cucumber and tomatoes into the same thickness, then combine all of these, adding salt and dressing (mix vegetable oil, egg yolk, and, according to taste, add mustard and vinegar, and whisk together). Then your appetizer is done. Next, arrange your appetizer in the following manner: In a tall, footed bowl, stack the ingredients in layers, making a tower shape, and drizzle with the dressing. Then on top of the tower place a hollowed-out chili pepper, and on its carved-out tip place an olive (or a small plum) and then surround the tower with olives (or plums), and around this arrange fresh apple and cucumber slices with their edges cut in a zigzag shape. On these slices place more olives, and finally around the outer edge of the bowl garnish with fresh lettuce leaves.
2. Apple Cup: Carve out most of the flesh of an apple to form a shell in the shape of a cup, then take the small pieces of carved-out apple, along with fresh cucumber, boiled carrot, green peas, and cabbage, and combine, adding dressing, and place back into the apple shell. Put the apples on a platter and surround with lettuce leaves, lemon slices, and rings of sliced chili pepper.
3. Little Basket: Take a large cucumber, scoop out the core, and carve into an oval-shaped basket. In the interior of the small basket you can add cold vegetables. Using a green onion, fashion a handle for the small basket. Around the small basket arrange cabbage leaves, and on top of the leaves you can place balls carved from carrots and fresh cucumbers.
Youyou attentively studied the three examples described and felt that the “Festive Appetizer” was not achievable. The wild fowl and olives would be impossible to get, and furthermore, the whole process seemed too complicated, like culinary acrobatics. The “Little Basket,” however, was feasible. Cucumbers, green onions, carrots, and cabbage were all easy to find. She then started carefully sculpting the “Littl
e Basket.”
Tiao was not interested in any of the “garnishing” techniques in cuisine. As an adult, every time she saw those “realistic” peacocks and flowers carved out of carrots and turnips, or goldfish made out of preserved eggs on a banquet table, she would respond with disgust at the showy bad taste. She thought that for a chef to spend so much time and effort on these decorations was not only unnecessary but simply a useless sidetrack of culinary art. That was why she didn’t applaud Youyou’s “Little Basket,” even though Youyou crafted an exquisite version with her inspired hands and a paring knife.
Fei had her own amusements at the time. She leafed through the pages of photos in Soviet Woman for the fashions:
This coat, with gold print, has raglan sleeves and no buttons. The skirt and lining are made of pale mauve silk.
Gorgeous two-piece dress, waist-length, with form-fitting top.
Woollen dress with white and green stripes, set-in sleeves. Skirt pleated along the stripes.
Boating clothes. Tank top, pants made of pea-green waterproof material, and a deep blue jacket with black and white stripes.
Fei devoured the fashions in the magazines, sure she would look very pretty in any of the outfits, particularly the boating clothes. It was Soviet Woman that first informed her that boating involved special clothing. How professional and romantic it made a pastime like boating look! Fei told Tiao what she thought and Tiao agreed with her. During a period in which no one could tell women’s clothes from men’s, everything they saw seemed beyond luxury. They stared at those clothes obsessively, so absorbed that they couldn’t help fantasizing that they could lift them right off the page and try them on. There was a black evening gown with flared skirt called “Cairo Night,” worn by a model with bare shoulders and a slender waist, which Fei couldn’t resist imitating. She put down the magazine, walked to the door, and took down a black raincoat that belonged to Youyou’s father, conveniently hanging on the back of it.