Mời cả nhà ăn cơm!

As I grew older there were some things I didn’t know. I’d research online on how to make particular things and I still do. Unless it’s quite a tricky dish, I will ask my parents, but the way that they communicate is like: „This much ginger (showing me their thumb), like this much soy sauce or like this much fish sauce (making a pouring action for a few seconds), you just taste it and you know.“ It’s not very precise. So, when I have to do large quantities for catering, I use online recipes, then do a trial and then talk to my dad about it to make adjustments.

Recently, because I’m pregnant, my father told me, “okay, don’t eat raw papaya or papaya leaves because this is what was used in the villages as an abortion medicine.” My elders share knowledge that isn’t generally talked a lot about. Though, nowadays there are a lot of books on Traditional Chinese Medicine and the medicinal benefits of how healthy it is to eat particular things during different seasons.

Most of my cooking memories as a child were wrapping chả giò. We’d wrap for the whole day with all my cousins and aunties. And my mum would guide my hands on how to do this. As I got older, my father taught me how to make more elaborate things like doughs for traditional dumplings–how to get the consistency right and how to balance flavors, and tricks on how to make things tender.