Asian and Rice

            This week I decided to make a Katsu Don (Pork cutlet over rice) from an article a read in my English class.  The article was Turning Japanese by Heidi Julavits, she talked about she found it hard to adjust to Japanese food, and when she was in Japan she always craved for sweets. However, after she left Japan, she craved for a bowl of katsu don. I felt like I can relate myself to the author when she was in Japan. I have lived in Taiwan for almost all my life, and coming to the states was a big change for me. I studied in an international high school, so I adjusted myself quickly to the culture. There was only one thing I couldn’t adjust myself to, which was the lack of Asian food in my body and soul.

Ever since I came here, I’ve been eating a lot of western food like hamburger, but in deep down, I was never satisfied with the food. I wanted rice! To me, rice is like fuel for my body, every day when I missed my daily supply of rice, I felt like no energy to do anything productive for the whole day. Don’t get yourself confused I’m not talking about Thai rice; I was talking about legit Japanese rice. There were only 3 ways to get that on campus, buy them from super market in university, go to an Asian supermarket, or drive to an Asian restaurant to get it. All of them were either sold out or I wasn’t able to buy it because the lack of transportation.

This time cooking was easier than last time, I felt like it’s either I’m starting to get the hang of it or maybe its because my Asian heritage inside me knew how to cook good Asian food. One thing I noticed in todays cooking was the difference between butter and vegetable oil. Last time, I used a lot of butter for my cooking and I ended up smelling really oily, like I haven’t taken a shower for days. This time I used vegetable oil to deep fry the pork cutlet and it smelled way better than butter. I don’t know if it’s because of the different chemical bonding between the two types of oil, but a shout out to Julia Childs or her fans “Butter is good in a lot of cooking, but you smell bad afterwards.”

Although, I said today was easier than before, I didn’t say it was perfect and that nothing had gone wrong. The pork cutlet was a little bit thick, the instruction said it should be ¼ inch thick, but because I lacked a hammering tool. I had to use my fist to punch it, which wasn’t really effective. However, it did release a lot of piled up mid term stress inside me. Every time I punched the pork, an image showed up in my mind that I punched the teacher for every hard or confusing question he or she gave. It felt so good. Also, I didn’t have sauce pan for cooking rice, so I ended up going to the super market and bought microwave rice. It wasn’t that bad, but I haven’t tried cooking my own rice so I can’t tell. Next time, I will definitely try cooking my own rice.

In conclusion, everything turned out pretty good. My friends really liked the katsu don I made, and I even got a lot of likes and comments on Facebook for it. Nothing beats the feeling when you get recognized for what your doing. After finishing the dish, I felt happy deep down, because cooking is really fun. You get recognized, you learn something new, and you release a lot of stress as a university student. I always used gaming to release my stress, but I think cooking is a more effective way than gaming. This is the end of my blog for today, Andrew out.

Reference:

1.     Julia Childs and Simone Beck. (1970). The Art of Mastering French Cooking, New York.

2.     Heidi Julavits. (2009). Turning Japanese, New York.