The Taste

 

In China, if people wanted to taste different types of food at the same time, they would visit Guangzhou. Many people from all over the country moved to Guangzhou for jobs, so it has food and restaurants from each state of China. In China, everything can be an ingredient. The ingredient includes animals that fly in the sky, swim in the sea, and live in the forest. For example, there are some unusual dishes, like roast pigeon, snake soup, and deep-fried insects. Before I lived in Guangzhou, I could not imagine that all these special dishes from each state of China served on the table. When I was living in China, I often felt shocked about why it could be an ingredient. Honestly, it was a challenge for me to eat snake soup. Even though these foods may sound unusual, I still miss them so much. There is some Chinese dishes that I have lost which are Niu Gu, Cai Huo Zhou, and spicy and sour noodle soup.  

The part of my favorite food that I miss the most is Niu Gu. Niu Gu means beef-bone. The best part of Niu Gu is not the meat around the bone, but the beef-bone marrow. Most restaurants offer straws to customers because it is hard to eat. When I lived in China, I usually went to eat with my friends at about 2:00 PM because this dish is usually sold from 1:00 PM to 5:00 every day. The restaurant used fresh bones to cook every day. They bought the beef-bone from the company about at 3:00 AM. My hometown is Kaiping which is next to Guangzhou. Niu Gu is more popular because it tastes better than other places. It had a secret recipe from their great, great grandfather. The secret recipe also included some Chinese medicine. I tasted the scent of the beef bone in my hometown when I was nine years old. However, after I moved to Chicago, I found that the meat tasted different. I could not find the Niu Gu which was the same as my hometown, and this made me feel sad.

Moreover, the food that I miss the most is a congee that is cooked with firewood. People call it “Cai Huo Zhou.” I loved Cai Huo Zhou because it tasted softer and sweeter than a congee that cooks with gas. The firewood’s burning area was bigger than the gas. It fully heated the bottom of the pot that cooked the rice at the same temperature at the same time. I still remember that I felt excited when my mother drove me to eat the congee. That was my first-time eating Cai Huo Zhou. It was soft when I put it in my mouth. After I finished, it still had a very strong rice fragrance around my mouth. I usually added a preserved egg and pork in it if I had a sore throat. Sometimes a congee can be used as medicine. When I had a fever or sore throat, my mother would buy congee for me. In the United States, people do not use firewood to cook and restaurants cook with more MSG. The congee was different from China because it was sticky. It looked like cooked rice with a lot of water but was not a congee. During this pandemic, I have tried to cook the congee at home, and it helps cure my nostalgia. 

Furthermore, spicy and sour noodle soup is special food for me, and I miss this from my diet. It also comes from other states in China, but it had changed its taste to please the people in Guangdong. When I was nineteen, I loved spicy food because of spicy and sour noodle soup. Once my best friend called me to go to eat spicy and sour noodle soup. It changed my impression of spicy and sour noodle soup after I ate it. The surprising part for me was the ratio of spicy to sour was perfect.  It came with a few side dishes and various vegetables to choose from at the restaurant. I got to know different types of spicy after the waitress’s introduction, like Hunan spicy and Sichuan spicy. I thought most people who lived in Guangdong prefer sweet and spicy. When I felt stress, I would go to eat spicy and sour noodle soup with my friends. It was a way that made me relax because it was spicy enough that made me sweat. It was also a level of spicy that I could accept. In Chicago, I tried spicy and sour noodle soup, but it tasted different because it had a heavier taste. The types of spicy and sour noodle soup were different. I hope I can find a restaurant that spicy and sour noodle soup was the same as my hometown.

 

Consequently, since I moved to Chicago, I miss my Chinese food a lot. I cannot find any food instead of them, or the taste is similar. I realized that my taste has changed since I moved to Chicago five years ago. It makes me feel unexpected is I would have a cold after I went out to eat every time. I never imagined that the MSG would affect me so much. Currently, I accept some tastes of American food. I can accept a little MSG, but I hope MSG will not affect me anymore in the future. If people move to a new place, and they cannot find their familiar food with their hometown, they can try to find the new taste that they prefer. I know it is hard to change the world, but I have learned that it is easier to change myself.