Dad’s gourmet palate

Dad ate strange things.

He enjoyed takuan, yellow pickled daikon radishes.  Mom said that, during his student days in Japan, he survived on takuan and rice.  He also loved raw sliced daikon with soy sauce.  The uncooked radishes are spicy and earthy. . . not the most desirable combination for kids.

Dried mullet roes (烏魚子) are Taiwanese and Japanese delicacy.  They are salted, pressed and dried.  The final products, in dark salmon color, shape like elongated butterflied pork chops.  Roasted lightly and sliced, they are often paired with scallions or garlic green and served with beer or Chinese liquor.  I never understood why dad savored these salty and fishy things as if they were the greatest thing the ocean had to offer.

Dad liked burned food.  If/when there was burned, crusty rice stuck on the bottom of the pot, mom would scrap off the crust and offer it to dad.  I never had a chance to enjoy steaks with dad.  I wonder if he would ask for the pieces that dropped down to the pit.

We all liked soft white bread and, sometimes, breads with raisins, sweet cream fillings or other tasty morsels.  Dad like bread with hard crust!  He called them French bread.  He would tear the long stick apart and eat it plain.  I didn’t know any French people.  They must have very strong teeth.

Dad often brought us treats on his way home:  steamed buns, dumplings and scallion pancakes. . . My favorites were pastries with flaky crust from a nearby shop.  They were the size of an adult palm.  The sweet ones were filled with red (adzuki) bean paste; the savory ones, meat or chopped vegetables.  Most of the time, they were fresh out of the oven.

In winter month, dad would bring home roasted yams.  They were hung and roasted in large clay urn-shape furnaces.  The vender would reach into the furnace with a hook to turn or to retrieve them.  The yams were sweet, soft and HOT.  I didn’t always eat the skins.  But if they were smoky and syrupy, I would lick on them.

Dad would also get roasted corns.  Salty and a little burned, I wasn’t too crazy about them.  Later, when sweet corns became popular, dad wouldn’t eat them.  He said corns shouldn’t be sweet.  To these days, I still wonder how corns tasted like when dad was growing up.

Although mom would not prevent us from enjoying the treats, she was never thrilled when dad came home with them.  She said that having treats would ruin our appetites for dinner.  Well, that never happened to me.  Treats were treats.  Dinner was dinner.  The more the merrier.