VietnamEazy

by Trami Nguyen Cron

  “My dish today is Steak and Potato Stir-Fry,” I continued, my voice quivering. “It is inspired by our family’s migration from Vietnam to France. I imagine the French brought potato to Vietnam and this is one of our family’s favorite dishes.”

  I placed the onions and garlic in a pan as I spoke. The timekeeper man was giving me a thirty-second signal. So I threw the fried potato, marinated beef and tomato all into the pan while frantically stirring, but I was so off my game today. The dish I had made earlier for the judges to taste was a sloppy, brown mess – the added tomato left the cubed meat steamed instead of seared. A rookie mistake I would normally never make.

  The next think I knew, I was sitting in the waiting room waiting for the judges to call us in. Todd kept asking me if I was OK and hugged me. I hated hugging, but it was somewhat comforting today. I let him put his long, beefy arm around my shoulder as he sat next to me waiting for the judges.

  “You did all right, don’t worry,” he gently whispered in his deep voice.

  He might have been an actor at times, but I could tell these words were genuine. Allowing others to see me weak was a foreign sensation to me. Not because it felt bad. But because it felt good! So I let go and allowed the tears to flow. All the hopes and dreams of getting Mom’s approval flowed away with them, onto Todd’s pink shirt as he turned me around to hug me and pat my head.

  I was a grown woman now. I was responsible for my own feelings, good or bad. My mother was done raising me. That had all ended years ago. I could no longer blame my mother for my unhappiness.

  “Kieu and Jay! Please come to the judges table,” Peter intoned, startling me with his booming voice, full of authority.

  I was not surprised to hear my name called, however. I was sure that between Jay and me, one of us would be sliced that day. Jay made a grilled red snapper fillet on top of quinoa and sweet potatoes. The twist was he cooked the quinoa in tequila to represent something about his twenty-first birthday celebration in Las Vegas. He would not reveal more details to us and kept quoting “What happens in Vegas …” with an impish grin.

  I squinted under the blinding studio lights as Jay and I stood uneasily in front of Gnarles, Linda and Peter, awaiting the verdict. I imagined being in a torture chamber where I was interrogated by a guard pointing a bright flashlight right into my eyes.

  “Jay,” Gnarles began. “Do you know why you are called to judges table today?”

  The director gave a hand signal telling us we needed to pause before continuing. Jay had a hard time waiting. He was so anxious to spit out his answer that he started to rock back and forth on his heels.

  “Yes, I believe I have the dish to beat today,” he blurted out.

  The director held up his palm to signal Jay to pause again. Jay pressed his lips firmly together and continued to sway backward and forward. The motion was so exaggerated and jerky, it reminded me of the glass toy filled with a red liquid that moved back and forth on my desk at work. Dippy Bird. I noticed that Jay’s bright green tie flapped like the tail of a Vietnamese garden lizard, which almost made me smile, but I was too busy thinking. His pronouncement made me wonder. I scrutinized the judges’ faces in search of subtle cues. Could Jay actually have been right? And if he were right that he had one of the best dishes, then didn’t that have to mean that so did I? Now it was my turn to be grilled.

  “Kieu, do you know why you’re called in here today?” Linda asked me.

  I was too emotionally drained to debate whether to tell the truth or make this a memorable TV moment for the audience by pulling out my alter ego.

  “Because it was one of the worst dishes I have made on the show,” I said, finishing with a loud sigh.

  I stood with my back straight and calmly looked back at Linda, who flashed me a kindly half-smile. It was a lot easier to be truthful than having to pretend to be someone else. I felt the same relief I did in Vietnam, the same feeling of home. I suddenly realized something else. Home was not a location. Home was not being with people. Home was how I felt about me. Home was me. With that thought I found a genuine smile for the cameras and judges as a warm sensation flowed through me.

  Peter was irritated at my smile, saw an opportunity to go on the attack, and pounced.

  The show needed drama because drama brought the ratings. Nobody would be cut any slack in that pursuit, and I was the perfect target for Peter’s bark today.

  “Why are you smiling if you think you made the worst dish?” he asked sharply.

  He cocked his head to the side and squinted, all the better to belittle me. At that moment it did not matter how he might feel about me personally. This was all about performance, all about creating moments that would grab viewers and, if the network were lucky, perhaps even trend on Twitter. They didn’t call it Sliced and Diced for nothing. But I didn’t care about any of that, not then. I held my smile even and looked back at him calmly before answering.

  “Because I did my best,” I said brightly, reciting the typical American answer, which on one level was a total lie, since I could have cooked a better version of the dish in my sleep most days, but on a more fundamental level, in fact my words conveyed a deeper truth, given my long and difficult journey of self-realization and the epiphany the day had brought me.

  “Well, I wouldn’t smile if I were you,” Peter snipped, giving me a final dirty glare before turning back to Jay and breaking into a smile. His sudden turning away, with the cold disapproval it conveyed, gave me a brief flashback to childhood agony and the cold disapproval that was so often my fate, but this time for a change the feeling only lingered for a moment. That really had been an epiphany! Something really had changed for me deep down inside.

  “Jay!” Peter cried gleefully. “Congratulations! You made the best dish today!”

  And with those final words I knew my fate was sealed.

  7

  Sweetness of Life

  FLAN CUSTARD

  Bánh Flan

  Flan is a popular Vietnamese dessert. It was brought to Vietnam by the French during colonial times. We love this dish. I prefer to eat it fresh out of the oven. But it is mostly served cold.

  Here’s my Mom’s simple recipe. It’s so easy anyone can make it. You’ll notice that I’m leaving the exact measurements up to you. You get to decide how much flan you would like to make.

  4-6 Servings

  INGREDIENTS:

  Caramel:

  1 part sugar

  1 part water

  Optional: 1 cup espresso or a teaspoon of instant coffee mixed in a little hot water

  Custard:

  1 part eggs (to serve 6, 1 cup whole eggs)

  1-2 teaspoons vanilla

  2 parts egg yolks (1/2 cup egg yolks only; more egg yolks will make a thicker flan)

  3 parts 2% milk (3 cups milk; you can use whole milk and the flan will be thicker)

  sugar to taste (keep adding sugar until it’s to your liking – for me, that’s a lot!)

  Optional: lemon/lime/orange zest for extra flavor

  To make the caramel, begin by melting sugar and water (and coffee, if desired for a slight bitter note) together over medium heat. Watch it carefully. As soon as it browns, remove from heat and pour caramel into individual ramekins or one large pan and coat the bottom quickly before the sugar seizes up. Be careful not to burn the sugar or it will taste bitter.

  For the custard, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix eggs lightly and add vanilla. If desired, grate some citrus zest into the egg mixture for extra flavor. Warm milk over medium heat. Do not let it get too hot. Put a strainer over ramekin and pour milk/egg mixture into it. Strain the lumpy egg whites out to achieve a smooth texture. Place ramekins in a water bath. Cover flan loosely with foil to prevent dryness. Cook over slow heat to prevent holes from forming in the custard, about forty minutes for small ramekins and sixty minutes for larger ones. After thirty-five minutes, place a toothpick in the center of the flan and pull out. If it comes out clean, it’s ready. If still wet, give i
t a few minutes. Do not overcook!

  SERVING: Refrigerate flan until ready to eat. Run a thin steak knife around the ramekin to loosen the custard. Place a plate on top, then invert onto the plate. Enjoy this simple VietnamEazy dessert.

  I was not surprised to be sent packing after my Steak and Potato Stir-Fry disaster. It would have been amazing to win, but I was also set to go home, although I was hardly ready to face Mom and hear her “constructive” criticism. Despite my newfound confidence, my fresh understanding of how unnecessary it was to feel I always needed my mother’s approval, I knew it would take years of practice to turn this awareness into a habit. At least I would not have to confront her with my failure to win the show until it aired sometime in October. I’d almost made it to the semifinal round, missing only by one dish, and I had somehow created a cooking segment from my trip to Vietnam. That was a huge accomplishment that still had me pinching myself with disbelief. Every time I thought about it again I broke into a smile.

  On TV, when they sent a losing contestant home all you saw was the disappointed one leaving the studio or trudging through an airport lugging their suitcases. In the real world of Sliced and Diced, being sliced meant you were sent to a small trailer outside the studio where legal counsel sat you down to drill you on the nondisclosure agreement. Only then were you allowed to leave.

  I was going to miss my fellow contestants. We said our goodbyes with the usual hugs, teary eyes and sad commentaries, all of us understanding that we might in some way stay friends, but no one knew what that really meant. Perhaps we would stay connected on social media and see pictures and updates from each other’s lives from time to time, or just as likely, within a few years we’d let all our links fade until we disappeared completely from each other’s lives. I was used to sloughing off old friends. My family moved around so often in the years after we left Vietnam, I could not recall the names of any of my childhood friends before the sixth grade. I learned young to adapt and accept new situations, skills that, for better or for worse, have prevented me from ever becoming too attached to any place or to anything or anyone.

  My final meeting with Gnarles had been surreal. He was not only one of the judges, he was also the producer of the show and looked the part staring at me from behind a large, imposing white desk. He was flanked by two stone-faced men in expensive dark suits who could have been anything from hit men to tax accountants, their expressions were so grave and inscrutable. Gnarles motioned for me to sit down and the two men in dark suits found their way to a large red couch. I felt far too emotionally drained to care much about what was going on, but it seemed clear based on the tone of the meeting that I was in some kind of trouble. Had I violated one of the many clauses of the dense Sliced and Diced contract? The familiar childhood fear of having done something wrong squeezed my stomach once again. To that point in my life, I was still often seized with that sensation whenever any person of authority summoned me. I found myself wishing that John were with me. Yes, he was emotionally unavailable, but his stolid manner came in handy. I wasn’t shy about letting him handle difficult situations like this.

  I was fifteen years old the first time I experienced being cast out from my clan. Somehow I knew I was forbidden from dating anyone until further notice. It was never discussed. It was simply assumed. Girls who liked boys were considered bad. Girls who dated boys were considered inappropriate. I did not quite understand at what age dating would be deemed OK. The expectation made clear to me was that I would get married after college, have children and continue on the path set before all of us. Somehow I also assumed I would marry the first person I ever dated, or I would be considered ruined. I was not sure how these specific conclusions entered my young mind, but I didn’t have to understand any of that: All that mattered was the imprint made deep into my belief system.

  Still, the natural urge to go on dates tugged at me. I had the attention of several boys at school, but the one who intrigued me most was no schoolboy, but a twenty-two-year-old Vietnamese man. On Thursdays, carnations dyed shades of green and blue were sold at school and the boys would often present me flowers. I hated the public spectacle of it, felt awkward, and wanted to disappear every time it happened. There was nothing romantic or endearing about it, not to me. It was contrived and torturous, especially going through the ceremonial “Thank you” and “It’s so nice.” Adding to the misery, I had to carry the flowers around all day to demonstrate my appreciation and my warm feelings for the boys, as if they had marked me for the day. Yes, I’ll admit, there was one aspect of the charade I enjoyed – the envious oohs and aahs from the other girls – but that shallow sense of satisfaction was fleeting.

  Even later, when dating men as an adult, I disliked being given flowers. Here you were, being picked up somewhere, and they hand you a flower. What are you supposed to do with it? Do you leave it in the car? Turn around and go back inside to put it in water? Carry it into the restaurant? Wouldn’t it wilt if it were not placed in water immediately? Seriously, to this day, I despise this gesture. Yet Vietnamese men adhere to this dating rule with few exceptions, a habit they learned from one another, I suppose, not from any women.

  The age difference between me and the twenty-two-year-old Vietnamese man was not much of an issue in our culture, unlike in American society. However, there were issues with his profession, his education and his height. He was not a college graduate and stood barely five foot four. I met him at a holiday party where he was in the band, playing keyboard and singing. He caught my attention by singing the most beloved Vietnamese version of the song “Papa.” As he sang, he kept glancing my way every now and then and each time he did, a warm feeling swept over me. I did not find him physically attractive, but the beauty of his voice overshadowed all his shortcomings.

  After months of sneaking in late-night phone calls with Van, I decided to meet him one day after school. I told Mom to pick me up after school a few hours later than usual. My story was that I had to make up a swim session for PE. I wasn’t in the habit of lying to Mom, and figured this sketchy assertion would do the trick. When she asked why I had missed a session, I realized that when you concoct a lie, you need a back story to go with it. After a brief moment of panic, I told her that I had left my bathing suit at home in the dryer one day. She frowned at me for my forgetfulness. Maybe this lying thing wasn’t so hard after all.

  I was thrilled to meet with my music man. Van picked me up after school and we spent two happy hours together before he drove me back to school before Mom would arrive. I was still high from our romantic interlude, sharing ice cream and juice in a local café. He was pulling up to the parking lot to let me out when suddenly out of nowhere in a slow-motion blur I caught sight of the shining glare of the hood of a car speeding toward us. I heard a loud “Boom!” and the whole car shook with the force of the collision and rattled me out of my high. I had never heard nor felt anything like that before in my life. After I woke up from my momentary daze, I noticed the door of the other car open and out stepped Mom. She had rammed the driver’s side of Van’s car!

  “Get out of the car!” she shouted at me in Vietnamese.

  I looked over at Van and he looked back with frantic, wide eyes. He was wedged into the car where Mom’s car had smashed against his door and could not get out. I was still looking at him when my mother yanked me out of his car.

  “Leave my daughter alone, you hoodlum!” she shouted at him, slamming the door shut.

  My head felt like it was about to explode. I bolted away, still enmeshed in a nightmare of profound confusion and dismay, and started to walk inside the school for no particular reason except to get away from Mom. She followed behind, assaulting me with her shouts and insults.

  “I can’t believe I raised such a daughter!” she screamed. “One who follows boys! One who lies to me! One who sleeps with boys! One who has thrown away her entire future gallivanting around with uneducated hoodlums!”

  Her endless name-calling came at me rapid-fire. I felt as
though I was trapped in a raging flood and as in the worst sort of torture, the water wouldn’t stop rushing and flowing over me. I was drowning, but somehow my legs carried me forward, away from her. I’d managed to grab my school bag out of the car and I grasped it now as if it were a life preserver. Mom finally caught up to me and grabbed my arm and spun me around. I was still stunned by the raw violence of the crash and its aftermath. My brain had not caught up with what was happening. I could hear the loud echoing din of car smashing into car. When my mother’s hand reached out with a swift lightning strike and landed against the left side of my cheek, I did not feel any pain. My entire body was numb. It was the only time in my life I had ever been slapped.

  Mom dragged me by the arm while school kids stood around agape. They were as shocked and frozen as I was. She shoved me in the back seat of her blue Thunderbird, where my youngest brother sat, and my older brother stared at me from the front seat. Neither of them had their seat belts on.

  Mom threw the car into reverse and backed away from Van’s car, suddenly freeing him. He jumped out of his car then just stood there, not knowing what to do next. Mom sped past him, running over his left foot. I saw him grabbing his foot and hobbling and looking at me with puzzled eyes before we rounded a turn and he was out of view. Mom’s barrage of words spat out continuously. She informed Minh she would take all my savings away from me as a form of punishment. He sat and listened without saying a word, nearly as stunned as I was. As an adult I have often wondered what went through his mind as the three of them sat in the car waiting for me that day, but I never asked him.

  We arrived home and Mom ordered me to go inside with my little brother and wait for her return. She was going to the bank and would bring along Minh to help translate. I was relieved to finally have silence. I looked at my little brother, who was only six years old at the time, and hoped he would not remember any of this. He went to the living room and turned on the TV. Chef Yan was on, teaching his audience how to julienne carrots in his usual funny manner, explaining everything in his charming, engaging accent. As a family, we all loved watching cooking shows and there was something both weird and soothing about Chef Yan carrying on happily while life exploded around me.