tran phuong soc, 1913 - 2008

all my life, i’ve been hungry. and it’s no wonder because i grew up in my grandparents’ kitchen where morning, noon, and night, something was always bubbling on the stove or baking in the oven. the banh pate chaud, warm baguettes and hot condensed milk at breakfast, the pot of porridge that greeted me when I came home from school, and the thit kho, canh chua, and rau xao we ate for dinner. cooking wasn’t just an activity that my grandparents participated in; it permeated their lives. they organized their lives around it.

my grandparents marked the seasons with food. in spring we candied wintermelons and kumquats. in summer we blanched mong toi that they grew in their garden. in autumn we spent weekends making mooncakes: grandpa rolled out the crust; grandma stuffed the filling inside the dough; and i fitted the cakes into wooden molds. a strategic whack released the cakes from the mold and they would be embossed with rabbits running across a meadow, birds migrating across a night sky, and persimmons still on their branches. the mooncakes, golden and shiny from an eggwash, would then be wrapped in parchment, ready to give out to relatives and friends from the old hamlets.

my grandparents expressed affection through food. laconic and reserved in verbal and physical displays of affection, they let their love flow through everything they cooked. there isn't an emotion that they could not convey through food. my grandparents used it to celebrate, to mourn, to praise, and to express appreciation, approval, and gratitude. food was even used to express apology. i remember one time when i was young, my grandparents wrongly punished me for an offense that i had not committed. later, when it was discovered that i was innocent, grandpa came into my room and sat down next to me. still angry, i turned away from him. he then produced an apple from his pocket and put it on the pillow next to me. it was from our garden. fresh picked, it still had its chalky sugar bloom. he patiently sat and waited for my indignant sniffles to subside, for my hand to reach for the apple, for my first bite, for my acceptance of his silent apology. then he patted my head, chuckled, and left the room.

it was while they were cooking that my grandparents were most relaxed and open. they laughed, talked about their youth; his years in seminary school and hers working in great-grandmother’s shop; their first years as a married couple; what life was like during the french occupation; how they lost their fortune twice (once in '54, when the country was partitioned and they had to abandon all their businesses in the north and move to the south; then again in '75 when the south vietnamese government collapsed); how they never let great losses defeat them; and how they rebuilt once again when they came to america, beginning with an underground restaurant that they ran out of their garage in aurora, colorado.

my grandparents were over sixty when i began living with them and i was always acutely aware of their age and mortality, that one day i would lose them, as well as their stories and recipes. in my twenties, i tried to write down my grandparents’ recipes so that they would not be lost to the next generations. i began to ask them how many tablespoons of sugar in their caramel base, how many pounds of chicken for a batch of stock, and how many cups of rice to make a pot of porridge. their answer to all my questions was invariably, “just until it tastes right.” i was a novice cook at the time and didn’t know what that meant, so i kept on asking about tablespoons and cups and pounds, to my grandparents’ increasing irritation. after a few months of trying to turn their cooking into fail proof recipes, i had an epiphany. my grandparents were talented and skilled cooks and their approach to cooking was unique. no collection of recipes would enable me cook to cook they way they did. so i let go of trying to write down the particulars of a recipe and began developing my palate and learning to determine by taste whether a pot of stock, caramelized pork, or curry needed more salt, sweetness, or time, and by doing this, i became a part of the joy that was present when they cooked.

like a migration route that once learned becomes embedded in a bird’s memory for life, my childhood spent cooking and eating in my grandparents’ kitchen has left a profound indelible imprint on me. when i want to show love, i bake a lattice-top pie. when friends are going through difficult times, i make them food so that they’ll have something comforting to eat in the fridge. when i’m sad, i instinctively go into my kitchen, survey what my pantry and fridge have to offer, then trust in the act of cooking to settle my spirit. and each autumn, as soon as the first crop of apples appear at the market, i take down my wood molds, pound out batches of mooncakes, and gather my friends for mooncakes and tea under the brightest moon of the year. when i received a text message from my brother that said that grandpa was in the hospital and that it was looking dire, i went into a tailspin. how do i convey to grandpa how much he’s impacted my life? how do i convey love and gratitude? how do i comfort him in his last days? by the time i got to my house, i knew what to do. i went into my kitchen and put chicken, brown rice, ginger, and onions into a pot and made grandpa’s porridge. it was the last thing i cooked for him.

there are many things i like about being a chef and restaurateur, but on the top of the list is the moment when i’m in my kitchen with my crew and we’re in the middle of a busy service; the rail is full of tickets; the printer is cranking out even more; all my burners are going, it’s hot and i’m sweating like nobody’s business. then, amid all the chaos, i hear laughter coming from the dining room. it’s the sound of people enjoying their meals with their friends. then it hits me, that familiar wave of happiness, i am in my element, i am back in my grandparents’ kitchen, i have found my way home.