Interview - Influences on Food Availability

Where did you grow up? Australia duh. Did you eat out often? If yes, where did you eat? Nahh, not really. Foods a big part of Chinese culture, so naturally its important, and it therefore makes sense that the important things should happen at home. So yeah, mostly at home Where did you store most of your food? Ahahaha!! What kind of question is that? In the cupboard, fridge, freezer, spare cupboard. Except for the rice. We keep it in this REALLY big container. Im guessing more traditional families, like back in China would keep their rice in an urn, but we keep ours in a plastic commercial one. =) Where were the main ingredients bought? For my meals? Ahaha! Woolworths for sandwiches; lunch. For dinner, my grandmas in charge of that. She goes to these Asian, yes Asian, grocery stores in aurburn and buys Asian, yes specifically Asian veges. The meat we eat is just normal, like beef, chicken. What was the food preparation like? Ummm, depends on what kind of food youre talking about. Now I dont know about European cooking/cuisine as Ive grown up differently, but we have different ways of cooking and therefore different ways of preparing food. For example, when were uhhh say I had a meat pattie (except it was a giant version of a normal one) yeah, that uses steam to cook it, so it doesnt dry up and become McDonalds. But also the water takes away some of the original uhhh intensity of the flavour when it was marinated. So that takes some time to prepare and let all the salt and other spices, well not really spices but like veges, to let their flavours soak in. So that happens when the meat is still raw, and you leave it for like an hour and come back to it. Its like taking the flavours to the max, so that when you cook it, some of the intensity fades and youre left with a nice dish. But say you were cooking leafy veges. Uhhh chinese choy sum. I had it for dinner tonight too. They were stir fried, and what we call cooked dry because, seriously there was like no juice left afterwards. They dont need to be prepared as intensely as the pattie because they were to be stir fried. And all stir fried does is make everything taste, well you know that taste when you get eating hot chips, that fried flavour, yeah stir fried pretty much does that, it adds that aroma. Like granted you can have foods that are stir fried with other tastes but they have sauces to make them taste that way, as well as having that fried taste. Uhh in terms of ingredients, we use a LOT of garlic (esp. in stir fries) and a LOT of ginger (esp. when we steam stuff). But my grandma taught me the Big Three: salt, sugar and Chicken powder (yeah I know sounds weird, but tastes good, see the pic ). Then shed let it sit/marinate, or when she was cooking just dump a whole heap of salt, sugar, and chicken powder. Yup.

What were the meal patterns that you had every meal? Eg. Entre, main, dessert. Entrees are usually soup. And not creamy heavy soups, I mean water-y see through soups. Main. Hmph. Rice. Definitely, hands-down THE main. And then we have other things, side dishes (but trust me, if you dont want a mouthful of boring old plain rice, they are REALLY important) that accompany the rice. Dessert, ahhh really not all that important in a Chinese meal. Personally my family has fruit, but thats because of our neighbour. =) Do you have any memories from when you were growing up at your dinner table? Yep. Definitely. There was the time when I finally learnt how to use chopsticks. My granny taught me, right after dinner, which was a bit ironic, in retrospect. Also, like the European rule, no elbows on the table, and eat with your mouth closed, we too have table rules. We dont have the elbows rule, but we have a lazy susan, and its a spinney thing cause we too many dishes; well you DO NOT spin it when someone else is taking food from a dish. Also we have the elephants flying across a river rule. That is a literal translation. It means you pick food on a (side)dish thats closest to you. For example, you see an ummm, piece of egg that has yolk and not just the white. BUT! Its on the other side. What do you do? You, do. Not. Take. It. It shows you have bad morals, and in Chinese culture that is like the epitome of what you should be concern about. Theres also the fact that you need to respect your elders, care for your youngers. Take the egg analogy again. In that case, IF you took the egg with yolk, you would give it to either an older person or your younger sibling. It sounds harsh, but since nearly all of the food cooked is so yummy, I personally dont worry too much about the younger sibling part, just for my nanny. =D What type of foods did you/your family enjoy/have often? Said in the question above, above; RICE. Gosh, some days I really hate rice As for what my family enjoys, pretty much everything. I mean, personally, my big no-nos are spicy stuff and bitter melon (and oh yeah, its as disgusting as it sounds, its melon thats bitter. I mean you only have to look at the weird shape and you think back away slowly), but my mum, dad, grandma, eat EVERYTHING. Did you all eat dinner together at a table or all separately? DEFINITELY at a table. Like this time I had too much homework to do, and I asked mum if I could eat it at my desk, and she flat out said no. Again this has to do with customs; that family is the home and heart of who you are, and this sitting down and having dinner together is the unity of a family. Would you ever like to go/live back there again? To live with? No. I need to find my own path, my own way, and Ive depended on them my whole life, I want them to be relaxed and free from me. Also, again with traditions and customs and the way I was brought up: I need to return the favour, well not really favour, but, my parents have done so much for me, I need to repay them. Chinese culture teaches, if nothing else, humbleness,

its why we bow when we meet new people, why we sit at a round table instead of a rectangular one (and in case youre wondering, its because circular tables show an equality, ie theres no head of a table. And also the circle of life.), its also why we share food, why we give priority to those older, and younger than ourselves. So yeah. =) What types of foods/ingredients were available there? Well, at my house, aside from the Big 3, theres a lot of spices, dried mushrooms (for soup) and veges (leaves and legumes), and meat. Yeah quite a bit of meat. Beef, chicken, some pork Did you cook often for your family? Aww, hell, no. My nannys in charge of that. And my mum. And my dad. What type of things are Traditional in that culture? Ill just give you a list: Rice Soup Round bowls Chopsticks The wok Round dishes Round nearly everything Tupperware Sharing food Sharing whats happened that day Discussing things

You can see its just as much about the atmosphere/manners as it is about the food. Did you use cutlery other than knife and fork? If yes, what were they? Ahh hell yeah. Chopshticks, ahahaha, chopsticks. Theyre designed to pick up small, bite-sized stuff, so using it on a steak wont work. Do you still eat the things that you grew up on? Yup. I love my grandmas special: Eggplant Steamed 3 coloured egg (dont even ask) Egg and tomato Steamed fish (you have to get the timing EXACTLY right, otherwise you either undercook it, which means food poisoning, or over cooking it, which is just as bad because then you have tough yucky fish)