Food - cooking it, eating it - is an experience for me. It's so much more than a utilitarian necessity; indeed, if I'm really hungry - I mean almost hypoglycemically hungry - I'll eat out or order in. Buddha (or some other wise guy) said the journey is as important as the destination: that about sums up my attitude towards food.
Growing up, my strongest memories are with my grandmother, spent in the kitchen, behind, around, beside, always underfoot. Her life revolves around ensuring there's food on the table; she and my grandpa may not have had much money, but her family never lacked for food. For my grandmother, food is synonymous with love.
My grandmother is almost 90 as I write this in 2006. Nothing has changed. I live halfway across the world from her, but I visit every year. And my trips are always filled with mutual anticipation: what I would like to eat when I'm there, and what she'll cook for me. Nothing much has changed since I was a girl growing up in Singapore under the watchful eye of her doting grandmother, except that now, as I watch her cook, I ask even more questions, and in the last couple of years, I've started to commit her answers and my notes on paper.
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