A refreshingly quiet night after the rain, a busy kitchen. The rice cooker placed in the corner is steaming white, it is the rice is ready, there is a dish stir-fried and ready to eat. My wife shouted from the room to start the meal quickly.
I put on my apron and brought out a palm-sized piece of bacon from the freezer, the golden grease frozen with a layer of frost. Placed on the counter, ice rustled under the blade of the knife, a piece of bacon, red lean meat and white meat skin neatly arranged. Wash in clean water, then put in hot water to blanch again. Thinly slice the red pepper, slice the green onion, shred the yellow ginger, and pat the white garlic. Soybean oil a spoon, heat oil, fry bacon, the fragrance burst out when the fat becomes transparent, lean meat from red to yellow. Sheng out, fried chili pepper, chili pepper skin wrinkled, put the meat, put onion, ginger and garlic, put star anise, cinnamon, dripping soy sauce wine, fresh onion, ginger and garlic with the old bacon, tumbling in the hot chili pepper. See the white onion seven minutes cooked, a few drops of sesame oil, out of the pot to serve.
The steaming sausage, which was nestled in the rice, was sliced diagonally from the rice cooker and placed in a large ring along the plate, with a spoonful of red chopped chili peppers from Hunan in the middle.
After the two dishes were served, there was an endless stream of praise.
“The lean meat is strong and chewy, the fatty meat is charred but not greasy, Xi, this bacon is really good. ” said the landlord brother, smashing his mouth as he ate.
“This is sent by our family from Hunan, authentic pork from the mountains! But I like sausages better! ” my daughter-in-law smiled with pride, in her native language, to her heart.
Yes, this piece of bacon and sausage was sent to me by my family to “quench my thirst”, and just arrived, we couldn’t wait to get it out. It was such a rainy night, such a northern land, and my mouth was chewing bacon, but my mind was drifting to the southern country where it was snowing in the waxing moon.
At that time I was a teenager, during the winter holidays, a month before the New Year. Outside the house with a little snow, and the north of the snow like sand, unlike the southern snow crystal like ice crystals, wet, touching the ground that melted, we children feel cold and wet outside the house, refused to go out, are sitting around the hall in front of the fire watching TV. Next to her was Grandma, who was busy, with a large sauce-colored porcelain jar in front of her, in which the bacon was washed clean and coated with crystal salt. At that time the grandmother was not particularly old, the wrinkles on her face were not so deep, she was very thin but physically fit, and all the household chores were arranged in an orderly manner. She sat on a small bench, apron, bent over, seriously busy, from time to time look up kindly at us, casually asked a few irrelevant words.
“It’s New Year’s Eve again, and I’m exhausted every year! “Grandma, while washing the meat with hot water, complained in a small voice, followed by a self-deprecating smile.
But isn’t it? For as long as I can remember, I remember the New Year as almost always a procedure. Two months before the New Year, grandpa and dad drove to the mountain people’s homes in a big way, just to buy a pig for the New Year, a month before the New Year, grandma will make all the meat into bacon, this work, to last for a month, and the bacon made can be eaten from the first year to the end of the year, in the summer, they will take the bacon off the beam, cut small pieces, wrapped in plastic wrap, put in the refrigerator, when you want to eat. When you want to eat it, you can take it as you go.
Her arms were soaked in hot water, turning red, and the hot air from the steam hit her face, and tiny strands of hair stuck to her forehead. She washed carefully with her heart, sometimes complaining twice: “The pig killer, Master Zheng, said he would remove the cover from the pig’s feet for me …… What a mess… …”, “This piece of meat is really fat, how can I eat it then… …”
After washing, is the application of salt, the salt crystals finely and evenly applied to the pork, then my grandmother would say to me: “Application of salt has a careful, if more, bacon will be salty, if less, bacon will spoil, will not be put in the summer. After that, I would anxiously look away from the TV and concentrate on watching my grandmother apply the salt, as if supervising her, afraid that if she applied too much salt, the meat would become inedible, or if she applied too little, I would have no bacon to eat in the summer.
Then came the stringing and hanging the bacon high up on the roof beam. This is when I need to help her.
“Yo, my Chaoer is getting taller and taller. The year before last, it required a small bench on the table to hang it up! “, I heard this and wanted to laugh while hanging – because that’s what Grandma said last year.
I love nights like this, like watching the fire and sitting next to my grandmother like this watching her cure bacon. It was freezing cold, but the steam from the fire and hot water didn’t make us feel cold at all. In those days, I would roast my family’s mochi, a delicacy made of glutinous rice, over the fire. The patties are usually called “glutinous rice patties”. I put the white, round mochi on the fire and watched it slowly puff up and break when I poked it with chopsticks, creating a fragrant smell, the smell of the harvest, signaling the ripening of the mochi. Other kids like to add sugar, or sprinkle soybean powder and sesame seeds, or dried rice, but I like to put nothing on it, because I think it tastes the best. Whenever I baked mochi like this, I looked at my grandmother, who talked to me, not rushing at all, just doing it slowly, because she had a mountain of tasks to do anyway.
“Chao-er, it’s cooked ……”
“Hmm? “
“The patties are cooked ……”
“Well ……” I looked back and sure enough, the mochi was bulging and I hurriedly used my chopsticks to I asked, “Grandma, you didn’t see it, how do you know? “
“I smelled it! ” Grandma’s tone was noncommittal.
“Grandma is great. “
“I’ll make you patties and fried bacon for lunch tomorrow. “
My eyes immediately lit up. This is one of my favorite dishes. The white patties were cut into small strips of one centimeter wide and one inch long, washed and drained, the bacon was cut into thin slices, and the onion, ginger and garlic were prepared. First stir-fry the bacon, serve, leave the oil, then stir-fry the patties, fry slightly on low heat, add the meat, add minced garlic, ginger, white onion, dried chili, less salt, drizzle soy sauce, stir-fry quickly on high heat, start the pot and plate. When you eat it, the bacon and rice are blended with each other, fresh and salty, and the patties are covered with a layer of golden, crispy outside and tender inside, which is indescribable.
Now it’s the night after the summer rain, and I have the flat, firm northern earth under my feet, but a bowl of my own family’s bacon in front of me, which is a warm feeling no matter what. Although my grandmother was far away in the south, the warmth of home was transmitted through the bacon. The day the bacon was sent, my wife and I chose the largest pig’s trotters and a few pieces of good bacon and sent them to my mother-in-law, hoping to pass on the warmth.
Now, sitting next to me is my wife, who allows me to enjoy a different kind of warmth during my time away from home, which I have never experienced before. I often think that the most beautiful images I have seen in the twenty years of my life are when my wife kneaded bread dumplings for me and when my grandmother cut bacon and fried patties for me.
I don’t think there is anyone in this world who is happier than me! Because no matter where I am, I am wrapped tightly with warmth.
This good man smiles, this bacon smells ……
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