Food Perception

        It is funny to think that when I was I was young, I only wanted to eat hamburgers and hot dogs. I guess kids are prone to these types of simple foods. Pizza not excluded. My mother (bless her heart) probably got really frustrated seeing all the ethnic, original, delectable, succulent foods in Montreal shops, bistros and food stores. She passed so many restaurants going to work and driving through the city, knowing how much was out there for us, and all her two boys wanted was Mc Donald's, chocolate chip cookies, and corn flakes.
Enough, I guess, was enough!
Early one Saturday morning, she came home from grocery shopping and got my brother and I out of bed. She called us to the kitchen and told us that we were going to try different foods. We looked at each other with a little boyish doubt in our eyes. So she tells us to close out eyes and open our mouths. Now a little fear started creeping up from my stomach. We were reluctantly defiant and just squinted. Ha! Like that was gonna fool my mom! She ramps up a bit and emphatically states that she is our mother, she loves us very much and would never give us anything that would hurt us. So we closed our eyes, and opened our mouths, and that was the moment that my perception of food changed forever.

       After my eyes were closed, I felt a fork with some strange textured food on my tongue. I wiped the contents of the fork off with my closed lips and just held it in my mouth, maybe hoping that it would somehow go away. "Now chew," my mother barked! My brother and I began chewing and slowly turning our heads towards each other and opening our eyes, trying to see if the other was gonna spit it out. As we chewed she told us that if we didn't like it, we did not have to eat it again, but we had to try it once! My brother, by this time, had his eyes open and a look on his face that was not disgust. I, being his junior of two years, would usually go with what he said or liked. Did I like it myself? Did the pleasant look on  his face influence me somehow?  We both liked it!! Whatever it was that my mom put in our mouths, we wanted more. We asked what it was, but she would not tell us. She just said, "No, have some more first!"
So we did. Like eager little birds in the nest, we closed our eyes and opened our mouths, chewed and smiled.
It was octopus!
"Octopus?!", we both cried in unison. "Cool!" We both ate the whole can!
From that day forward, my mother would wake us up on Saturday morning and tell us ritualistically to open our mouths and close our eyes. We were eager, and did it even before she asked.
So many types of food were introduced to us this way: octopus, yogurt, kiwi, oysters, tripe, rabbit, and many more. Eventually we just started trying new foods without the ritual, but it was fun doing it and anticipating what our loving mother was going to feed us.
She never put anything in our mouths that we didn't like!

   Thirty years later and I am not a chef, nor have I had any formal classes. Just a foodie who has worked in restaurants here and there and picked up a few skills and tips from my parents, chefs, and various cooks. I want to encourage people to at least try different foods, and experiment with the foods you are familiar with. Don't just buy the same foods every single time you go to the store! Buy shallots instead of onions, buy bok choy instead of cabbage, buy leeks, artichokes, cauliflower, shitake mushrooms, experiment my friends!

Photo:Diana Itzel

This is me in the kitchen making sushi for about 20 guests. Sushi is very labor intensive, but if you can eliminate the labor costs, you can serve many people cheaply.

Photo:Diana Itzel

Photo:Diana Itzel

I made about three of these trays of sushi. It takes a long time, so do the prep work  ahead of time, if you are having guests. There are thousands of sushi books out there, so my advice is to just buy one (or more) that has simple pictures and simple instructions. Sushi comes from a very exigent culture, so take everything seriously, no shortcuts and have as high a standard as you can muster. Sushi must look good as well as taste good. If you are bold enough to try raw fish, make sure you ask for sushi-grade fish. DO NOT just buy fish from a local supermarket to eat raw! Some people think that sushi is always raw fish, but it is not, sushi can be vegetarian with no problems. Make sure you clean your knife with a water/vinegar solution 10 parts water and 1 part vinegar should suffice. Clean your hands with this as well. It will keep the rice from sticking to your fingers  and sanitize your mitts too! :-)

Use a rice cooker if you cannot make the rice in a pot. I use a pot with a tight-fitting lid exclusively, but I was not very good at the beginning. Don't lose faith if you fail the first time! (Do not lift off the lid to the pot while the rice is cooking!) Sushi rice can be found in any Asian food store or maybe even your local farmer's market.

There is so much information of the web and in books, that I don't need to go into any detail here. My suggestion is to get a book (or books) and read, read, read it! Have it in the kitchen as a reference, and when you get better, you can throw sushi parties and have it handy for your guests to read.

I have come along way from just wanting to eat just hamburgers and french fries. Open you mind, open your palate, have fun! Thanks for reading!