Dumplings

Adopting traditions

A dumpling might be considered the hand pinched oaty, brown sugar islands on an apple crumble. Or the biscuity hood of a chicken pot pie. Some kind of hush puppy or a ravioli’s cousin’s cousin, still kin but hard to trace. As far as the kitchen, thats as much as I know about a dumpling.

In the between season, the wild winds make for wonder. Without messages from the garden or family recipes, we start seeking. Real people making real food with real meaning. Much like uncovering one’s own food traditions, it is slow, tasting, watching.

And then I see it on the front of a newspaper at the library, Lunar New Year is here! It feels as far away as soy sauce is from balsamic but let’s go. The unearthing, an exploratory pace, much like the littles plodding singular purpose pace. Unhurried, zig zaggy, with bowls full of repetition.

First, load everyone up. Two sets of shoes, four jackets in case, reluctant husband, exuberant babies, towards a Vietnamese Tết festival and the food. Finding the little old ladies with pointy hats that tie too tight under the chin sitting over ironing board grills. The noodles plain and soft, its flavor opposite tough salty pork, in a puddle of sweet tang. The kids spin around dance in a sea of kimonos. I watch their eyes take in everything not in our home.

Second, find the recipe. We don’t have a person to call for the answers. We eat at a couple “mean lady Thai” spots, getting a front seat to the yappy, arthritic, mammas who shove large bowls at us reminiscent of what we think we ordered. Delicious and worth the emotional dismissal. Still estranged and lost, my whiteness turns to the New York Times cooking app. A nice lady appears with a video tutorial and mentions all the things, cooking with kids, New Year tradition, commemoration, rustic. There’s our mamma.

Third, find the local Asian market. Wheeling past the stacked boxes of all type of Vermicelli nodding towards a whole people born in the uses and ways of this one noodle. Rows of bright red oils, giant bags of fish dust, jars of white asparagus in water. Repeat the list, check the cart, Oh and that sweet chili sauce ole reluctant likes. Buying the kids unfamiliar drinks with cartoons and fun squeeze tops, to sink the place in memory. Make eye contact with the other shoppers who perk up confused to hear my strangeness. “Yes sissy’s is purple, yours is green.”

To recreate something not in my blood, in the dug out, muscle memory of these hands, deserves an adopted reverence. Admiring the elders, trusting the ingredients, and following the process. Creativity is not a tool here, observe and abide. Take in the pushy carts, foreign smells and decorative language. Be awed by the red bulbs with gold tassels dangling above pink cherry tree branches. Pay attention.

“It has to keep being fun for me, I can’t just produce meals every night.”

It’s 6:30pm and everyone is…the wheels are coming off. Reluctant has chopped up and tried the hand blender on the chicken thighs. Babies are naked and moving between holding big peoples legs, the sous chef chair, the bath, and the floor in the living room where a tiny dvd player distracts them.

The dough is easy to make. Like my grandmother’s measurement for liquor in Zabaione, half of the egg shell just cracked full, the mamma uses chop sticks to mix and fill everything. The simplicity is electrifying. This, this is what there is to learn. The dough stays damp under cloth, as instructed. Onto chopping celery, Bok choy, and the unequivocal garlic chive, to salt and hand squeeze, like a good kale massage. Twisting up the tofu just like she teaches, it breaks down removing liquid while crumbling. I split the greens in two bowls, one for the tofu, one for the chicken thighs. Adding in soy sauce, without the confidence of kosher salt, little bit, little bit more, fuck it GLUG. Limited drops of chili crisp holding back for the kids, dribble of rice vinegar for a tart finish.

“What are these?”

“Those are back up in case the fresh dough didn’t work out.” Hong Kong style frozen wrappers.

He starts fumbling with them and makes a terrible upside down, billowing mini Bao then puts it crease side down in the pan. He has shucked all the thigh meat off the bones and chopped or beat it into submission. The worst job. He’s adopting too, aggressive, hungry.

Adding the first test dumpling into the cold pan with oil, before it gets too hot, then in goes water to steam. Naked little comes in and helps make a snake out of the dough, I use a bench scraper to cut the 1” nubs out of the snake. Rolling out the nubs with a glass water bottle is imperfect, far from the art it possesses. Littlest naked is entertained for a bit, the other naked is still in the bath talking to himself. She jumps down and makes a lap around the house.

“How did you pinch it again?” Leaning in, repeating the pleats.

“It’s just this little push of your finger out, then fold and pinch”

He tastes the the first veg dumpling. Gives the other half to the nakeds.

“Good,” through teeth trying to cool its catch.

He joins me in earnest filling and pinching. I roll the dough, he dabs and steams. A three dumpling plate is ready for the kids, whew. Setting it in front of them on the ground dropping the chop sticks loudly on the plate as an invitation. They sit up to play with sticks and eat, keeping eyes on Thomas the train.

This is cooking too, not just the making but the shopping and smelling and hearing. The distant doing.

“I’ve wanted to do this for a long time, thanks for getting all the stuff.” His eyes don’t leave his doughy pinched babies.

Yeah, yeah, I nod. Continuous rolling and filling with water bottle and chop sticks.

Big naked comes back wanting more. I refill. No longer reluctant follows him in with the camera. My my.

It’s 7:15pm now and the edge has lifted.

Reluctant has eaten 15 probably, the naked’s 6, and I keep tasting and editing with my own little bowl of soy sauce and chili paste. The dough could be thinner but that will come. The garlic chives gesture towards onion, garlic, chive flavors but with a grassy bite all their own. The chicken steams up into globular bursts while the tofu lazes about in the dimpled crevices. Crisp on the bottom and steamy against teeth. There wasn’t enough time to sit and enjoy. Better even, the night folded over and enveloped, dumpling like, traditions inside traditions, adopted and shared.

Out of dough, I pack up the fillings to make more tomorrow.

There is raw chicken on the cutting board and counter, scraps in the sink, soy sauce drips on the floor. I am tired, the tightness under my shoulder blades feels like it will be held there forever. I shove one whole soy soaked dumpling in my mouth and take off my apron.

The nakeds are dressed and we head in for books. They will be asleep in 15 minutes.

I slide back into the kitchen starting to clean. The sous slides in and bumps me off the line.

God bless.

I sit down for yogurt and granola dessert.

Cooking with littles becomes cooking around them, focused not on doing but being, lost, found, curious. Amid the interruptions and cultural constraints we make dinner is on the floor tonight memories. Adopting more yummy effort-full flavors.