Scallion Oil Noodle
Green are the fresh scallion leaves,
we cut them and put them into the hot oil.
Handmade noodles come from the flour shop in the market,
they are combined with the soy sauce and fried scallion oil.
They are put in small bowls to ensure they are evenly mixed with sauce,
I eat more, worrying that I won’t have this homemade dish after leaving.
Balmy fragrance wraps around the tip of my tongue,
sweet fried fish along with delicate pork ribs.
Passing my mouth it is more umami than meat,
I urge my cousin, offering them like treasures.
I wish to go with a time machine,
returning to my childhood to see my grandpa making the noodle once again.
The journey is hard, I worry about whether it can be realized,
but the memory is unforgettable and deep in my mind.
A bowl of noodle was a common thing,
grandpa’s care and love make clear its uniqueness to me.
Across the ocean in the public kitchen,
we fry scallion oil in the frying pan.
Late in the day when my friends and I miss our family dishes,
this flavor too is indispensable for the occasion.
I chose Cold Noodle Soup with Sophora Leaves by Du Fu to intimate. I always love reading Du Fu’s poems since his realism style depicts everything vividly and reflect many social problems at that time. Although many other students dislike reading and analyzing traditional Chinese poems, Du Fu’s wonderful writing skills and patriotism always make reading his poems an enjoyment to me. As a patriotic poet, Du Fu wrote many poems that reflect social problems when he was in Sichuan after An Lushan Rebellion. Therefore, it’s surprising to see that he also recorded local food and life in his poem. The vivid depiction of the cold noodle soup makes me want to eat it when I was still reading the poem. Also, in my opinion, when Du Fu mentioned the scene that “the ruler is enjoying the cool”, he tried to indicate that the emperor himself wouldn’t avoid the summer heat without eating the same noodle and wouldn’t be able to govern the country well without understanding normal people’s lives. The literariness and profound theme make the poem worth analyzing and intimating.
While intimating the poem, I realized how common and important it was using food as medicine in ancient Chinese people’s lives. Because of the hot and humid climate in Sichuan Province, it’s hard to bear the summer heat. Without electric fans and air conditioners in ancient time, people would have got sunstrokes if they had not done anything to avoid the high temperature. The sophora leaves, which can bring the cool feeling to the human body, were used then. By mixing the juice into the noodle, it would not taste wired. Therefore, this common plate of cold noodle soup just shows how wise working people were in ancient time. Moreover, the patriotism reflects another type of culture of the original author. Under the centralization of authority, it’s so hard for the governors to understand normal people’s thoughts and change the situations unless they could experience civilians’ daily life. This piece of work just reflects the philosophy of governing the country by a simple dish of noodle; as a result of which, it is a demonstration of how food is used as an analogy to the politics in traditional Chinese culture.
Compared to the culture reflected in Du Fu’s poem, mine is more specific to my family culture. Like a lot of Chinese men, my grandfather is not good at expressing his love to my cousin and me. Instead, he likes to make delectable meals with the best ingredients for us, and the scallion oil noodle is the most representative one since it is always made in our birthdays. Each time my cousin and I praise the delicacy of the meals, we can see the brightest smile appearing on our grandfather’s face. At that moment, I deeply understand how much grandpa loves us. Because of grandpa’s love and care, when nostalgia comes over me, his scallion oil noodle, which is made on the warmest day every year, always gives me lots of comforts.
There is one cultural DNA, which is the simpleness, embedded in both Du Fu’s piece and my piece. The cold noodle soup with sophora leaves and the scallion oil noodle are both simply made with noodles and sauces. However, these simple dishes were passed by generations for thousands or hundreds of years. Today, we can still taste the same flavors as people in the past did. As the Taoism claims, “The greatest truths are the simplest”, the greatest food dishes are also very simple. Even though the noodles themselves are quite simple, they could even taste better than some precious dishes. The scarcity of physical resources limited ancient civilians’ choices of food ingredients but boosted their ideas when making delicious dishes with the simplest methods and ingredients. The indication used by Du Fu also demonstrates that even the principles as big as governing a whole country can be represented by a simple dish. Our food is just a metaphor of the principle, which is pursued by all ages of Chinese people, that the greatest is the simplest.