together, every family would try its best to accommodate the visiting relatives. My family during that time would get a portion of pork; that is the pig was butchered by the village administration, and then the pork was distributed to more than thirty families. Butchering a pig for Spring Festival was a great bliss to the villagers in poor times and didn't happen every year.
My grandma told me that she would pickle part of pork in order to keep in store. And the remaining parts had lots of uses. Making a traditional food called "You Tofu", which could be interpreted as fried bean curd; grandma put the meat sauce into Tofu. "Dan Jiao", known as egg dumpling, was always my family's favorite. The egg glaze was evenly poured into a flat spoon, and then put pork sauce to the middle of the spoon. Flip the curdling glaze in order to shape it into a semicircle. The appearance of Dan Jiao is particular: it's like the Chinese ancient currency "Gold Ingot". It has the moral of treasure. My grandma and my aunt would be very busy of making Dan Jiao because days later many relatives would come to visit. Even though Spring Festival is an only chance to gorge, my grandparents still restricted my dad and other siblings because food, especially meet, was too precious to consume immoderately in hardship times. My family would save some for the upcoming month.
But now with the development of China, more people are getting rid of poverty. After I was born, my family moved to downtown. Indeed, people's life changed over the past thirty years. The changes are earthshaking. But the sentiment to food during the hardship with the lapse of time no longer exists. The older generation, including my grandparents, has the crisis awareness of famine and poor deep-rooted. It's hardly erase memories of difficult times in their lives. Therefore such memories are still kept passively. But to the generation of my father, the longing for food linked to Spring Festival retains relatively impressive, though not as strong as older generation.
My mom, when we family have Dan Jiao in casual dinner, will talk about her making of Dan Jiao in childhood. I do want to know the taste of Dan Jiao in her childhood has anything to do Dan Jiao she eats today. Today's Dan Jiao must be better to me, whom as one of the new generation. Memory for food is a sentiment connected to the circumstances and experiences more than to food itself. It could be somewhat inherited from generation to generation but vanished in the end. But I can clearly figure out image depicted by my mom:"A girl sitting on a small chair coals a stove with dirty briquettes. Then she is holding at the same time with a bowl of egg glaze and a spoon. Skillfully picking the pork sauce into the glaze layer, after finishing a Dan Jiao, she quickly and carefully delivers the final product to a wood bucket. The fire is getting fiercer. Though the girl is keeping cooking the same thing for a whole night, delight and expectation are both on her face to welcome Spring Festival. "
Foodsion/April, 2014 24