For anyone who has seen the movie Ratatouille, it certainly isn’t an issue of much debate that the scene where Anton Ego (the villainous food critic) was consumed by sweet, poignant nostalgia is among the most memorable and touching of all scenes in the movie. (Apologies about the spoiler, now you know.) When served with the ratatouille made by Remy, Ego was deeply moved by this delicious dish full of familiar and sentimental flavour. All of us have different connections with food; we see how the food we make, eat, and share, plays a part in building our relationships and experiences since childhood. Food, no matter how simple, is inherently linked to our past, present and future.
Source: TIME
Our early years as little-lambs or troublemakers, whichever sort of child we might have been, form an undeniable basis for our understanding of the world around us, a feat which involves the humans in our lives. More often than not, these relationships interact and intertwine deeply with food, seasoning our moments with these people with flavour to form core memories of our childhood.
Here, we have compiled a small anthology of sorts, allowing us to reminisce on our past (and/or current and future) relationships, all in relation to one of the greatest gifts to mankind, flavour.
I, Ziv, will first recount an experience I shared with my grandmother several years ago, one still vividly etched in my mind.
Flour, water and a drizzle of oil. That’s all you need to make fresh, chewy hand-made noodles. Well, at least that’s what Nai Nai taught me.
My entire childhood was spent with Nai Nai. Looking back, I fondly recall a majority of that time being dedicated to food. Nai Nai would carry the much young version of me in her arms, pushing her three-wheel shopping trolley to the wet market. There, she would patiently pick out the freshest ingredients while chatting with the vendors, strangers which, over the years, gradually became close friends. At home, I would watch as Nai Nai sorted out the fresh produce, meat and dairy products into little bins which she would then place neatly in the fridge.
I was fourteen the very first time I paid close attention to how Nai Nai made those noodles. She sat on the kitchen floor with an enormous plastic bowl wedged between her thighs, a bag of flour and a small cup of water placed nearby. I watched closely as Nai Nai mixed one cup of flour with ⅓ a cup of water. She tilted the cup gently, not letting even a drop of water splash out of the bowl. As the liquid touched the smooth surface of the flour, Nai Nai began kneading the dough with her wrinkled fingers. This process repeated itself at least five more times, till the bag of flour was emptied.
Curious, I asked Nai Nai, “Why couldn’t you just have added all 5 cups of flour at once and adjust the amount of water accordingly?” In Chinese, she replied, “Time. Noodles take time. They need to be made slowly and steadily.” This is when I first started to appreciate the virtue of patience. I recounted the number of times Nai Nai would coop herself up in the kitchen whipping up a birthday dinner for our family of nine, or when she woke up at ungodly hours just so she could be the first in line at the wet market. Here, the respect I had for Nai Nai grew.
At fifteen, I challenged myself to make the same noodles Nai Nai had cooked for us so often. With the right proportions of ingredients memorised in my head, I was determined to accomplish my mission. Nai Nai watched me mix the flour and water together, handing over to me a large glass bottle. Confused, I looked at her and wondered what the bottle was for. She signalled towards the noodles and I realised, the bottle was her substitute for a rolling pin. It was then when I saw the beauty of simplicity, in the noodle’s ingredients and its creation.
Simplicity and patience - two of Nai Nai’s strongest qualities I only recognised after this experience. I used to think that food was a mundane commodity with little significance. However, the experiences surrounding food which I have been fortunate enough to share with Nai Nai, helped me realise this - that even ordinary, unremarkable things like flour foreground our humanity and uncovers the numerous layers of our individuality.
Next, I, Xinyue, will be sharing about a painful yet meaningful encounter that added a dash of spice to my youth.
Auntie Fasiyah’s food was always red. Anything that touched her plate turned a bright shade of vermillion without fail, all three meals of the day. Even dumplings were not forgiven, each of them promptly transformed into balls of fire before being sent into the iron gates of her mouth.
My younger self had always been amazed yet bewildered at Auntie Fasiyah’s meals. “Auntie, why do you need to add that red sauce into everything you eat?” I always bugged her with the same question.
“I need it to enjoy my food. If anything feels tasteless or not nice, just add this sauce!” Auntie Fasiyah would answer in between bites, her nimble fingers mixing the sauce into her rice, then sending it into her mouth in one swift motion.
The naive ten-year-old me marvelled at the idea of a magical elixir that turned all food delicious. Does such a thing really exist? Slowly but surely, curiosity engulfed me like a ball of flames. “Auntie, can you make some for me?” I could definitely use some of that mysterious red sauce.
Upon my request, Auntie Fasiyah whipped out cloves of garlic, salt, and, lo and behold, 2 bird’s eye chillies, glistening with a familiar shade of vermillion. Bird’s eye chillies? I had the spice tolerance of Mcdonalds' chilli sauce. Before I could comprehend the gravity of this burning problem, Aunty Fasiyah had already ground all the ingredients into a red hot paste. There was no turning back.
Like a forest fire, the burning sensation started from a tingle on the tip of the tongue, then quickly erupted to engulf my whole mouth. Soon, I was in tears. Willingly or not, the painful taste would forever be seared into my mind as one of the key memories of my childhood.
The chilli was hot, but what had burned more was my admiration when I saw how Auntie Fasiyah had nonchalantly scooped handfuls of red hot chilli sauce into her mouth. Auntie Fasiyah had been the strongest person my young self had known, resistant to not only the hottest of chillies but also the myriad of adversities thrown at her. Her hardy and fiery personality had braved her through many difficulties, from leaving her home at 17, to surviving a motorcycle crash that had almost left her disfigured, to working alone in a foreign country, in a stranger’s house, without any family or friends in sight. If resilience was to be translated to spice tolerance, it would take the Carolina Reaper to make Auntie Fasiyah’s mouth tingle.
My admiration for Auntie Fasiyah only grew when I asked her about the origins of her recipe. Turns out, it was a recipe that everyone back in her hometown in Indonesia knew. When Auntie Fasiyah left her country to work in Singapore, she had to leave behind most of her belongings, together with her friends, family and home. Unlike objects, recipes were intangible. The chilli sauce recipe was one of the few things that could be brought over to Singapore and which she held dearly to. It reminded her of her roots, her hometown and her identity, her beacons of hope amidst unfamiliarity and hardship.
She brought me up to her bed, to a small corner where her possessions lay. Carefully, she retrieved from amongst her trinkets an old photograph. On the yellow and crumpled paper, a young boy around my age smiled brighter than ever. “My boy loves eating spicy food. One day, I will return to my hometown and see my boy again.”
Perhaps spice was just a taste to some. Perhaps to others, it was just an unnecessary pain in their tastebuds. But to Auntie Fasiyah, spice was home. To me, spice was like a burning flame in the soul, refusing to dim even in the darkest of times. Perhaps spice contradicted with the ideal sweet image of childhood, but it nonetheless resembled a key flavour of my youth, a flavour that shaped my character. It not only taught me perseverance, but also to always hold dear to the things that ignite the flame in our souls.
Last but (hopefully) not least I, Tiffany, will tell a story about the flavor of emotions. Growing up I was an enthusiastic girl with few troubles, I wish the latter were still the case, but on this day I made a good point of troubling myself over little.
If you ask any child what their favourite subject in school is, there is a high likelihood that their immediate answer will be “recess”. Who doesn’t need a break sometimes? I think this is a preference that transcends age. Either way, this memory takes place during recess, but it wasn’t fun and lively as usual, instead, it consisted of me sulking at the corner of the courtyard by myself. Picture the boy in The Grudge but with a purple winter jacket on. My reason for being upset was that a friend of mine, by the name of Noa, was playing with another group of kids while I was by myself, being lonely. My usual clique wasn’t around and I didn’t enjoy the game the others were playing, king out, I always lost immediately. I’ll let you decide for yourself whether or not my sour mood was justifiable.
Crouched down on the ground, I started to cry. Perhaps a tad bit dramatic, but that’s beside the point. Suddenly Noa showed up in front of me and asked “why are you crying?”, and I, attempting to play it cool, said “it’s just the wind”.
Noa probably saw straight through my self-piteous lie and told me something which really cemented this moment as a ‘core memory’ for me. He asked how my tears tasted, then he said that when you are crying sad tears, your tears taste salty, whereas when you are crying happy tears, they taste sweet. I had never heard this saying before and in that moment, Noa seemed to me like an angel full of wisdom and kindness (not the correct Biblical reference I suppose, can’t help it that was his name). I don’t remember if I tasted my tears myself or if he did. In the latter case that would’ve been quite romantic, or maybe gross, or a bit of both. Very k-drama-like at least, let’s cast Lee Minho for a remake of this please.
Since then I’ve thought about that instant very often, perhaps every time I cry any flavour of tears. Although the tears may not literally taste like honey or Himalaya salt, I do believe that one’s sentiments in the moment itself can give anything a sort of sweetness, or saltiness, making Noa’s words resonate with truth. Each person perceives flavour so differently to their neighbour, and in the same way our experiences can each be perceived with a different flavour, seasoned by perception and emotion. The salt in our tears may bring to light our sadness, while their sweetness when we are happy will lift us up even more, at least if you’re a sweet tooth like me. The memories we form during our childhood will undoubtedly influence how we perceive other people, our relationships, ourselves, and our emotions. I would like to think that thinking of the flavours of our feelings is a nice way to connect with ourselves a bit more and perhaps with our inner child. The one who discovered the flavours of our youth.
In a nutshell, our memories all have distinct flavours, some more literally than others.
These distinctly flavoured memories offer insight into our identity, our unique connection with food, as well as our relationships and experiences since childhood.
Perhaps the ratatouille that Ego tasted was nothing but delicious enough to render a change in his cynical perspective, or perhaps it had been something more: it had reminded Ego of his humble beginnings, and of his mother's love and support for him.
That is the flavour of youth.
About the authors:
Ziv:
Ziv is a freshman pursuing a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics at NUS. The highlights of his childhood include binge-watching Nickelodeon and Disney Channel shows and jealously watching as his friends ate KFC (He was allergic to chicken up till the age of 18). He is now able to consume chicken without vomiting within 5 minutes, but is disappointed by how overrated fried chicken is.
Xinyue:
Xinyue is a freshman studying Law at NUS. Her early childhood years mainly consisted of excessive eating, towering over other kids, frolicking around with her friends at the park and adopting a new persona every day. Fast forward, she still eats excessively and towers over some people, but now trudges through Botanic Gardens (for lectures) and hopes to adopt a cat in the future.
Tiffany:
Tiffany is a BBA freshman at NUS who was born and raised in Sweden to a French father and Singaporean mother. Her childhood, according to her, was dope. Something new that she has learnt while working around the theme of childhood and nostalgia with NUSCares is that she was rather excessively chubby in her pre-/early- teen years. A fact which she had not been so aware of before her recent trip through memory lane AKA school catalogues and class photos.