Reading “Eating White” written by Nicholson, I find he emphasized
a lot that his mother was fond of white food when she was alive, which were
also considered as his mother’s comfort food. To satisfy his father’s and her
tastes, she would even attempt to cook the food with cream, white cornflour
sauce and other white seasonings. Because of her mother’s special favor of
white food, Nicholson once came up with an idea that white represents purity
and being a catholic rendered his mother to prefer white food, that is, she
liked white food mainly due to their color. It was just a guess but inevitably
explained some reasonable possibilities. Further, white food representing
purity was also the cultural significance that Nicholson attached to food.
Moreover, as Nicholson mentioned in his article, “If you grew up in England at
a certain time in history, your school, on behalf of the government, provided
you with a daily third of a pint of ‘school milk’, and we were led to believe we
had a moral duty to drink it.”(EatingWhite49) For me, it is likely to be a cultural
significance attached to white in England, since British people were fostered
to drink milk every day when they were very young, which was a cultural custom;
it was also one of the reasons why Nicholson and his mother preferred white
food. When it comes to personal significance attached to white food, Nicholson
also made the speculation: it was the ration of milk and cream during the World
WarⅡthat contributed to her mother’s deep love of white food. Later,
because of the cultural and personal significance of white food talked above,
Nicholson also wanted to eat Cheshire cheese when he moved house and lived in
Los Angeles.
Ahn, a Korean-American, paid more attention on the cultural significance
of Korean food. In his mind, cooking and having Korean food represented half of
his ethnic roots and recalled Korean culture. In order to gradually cultivate Korean
culture to his son, he taught him a little Korean and cooked various Korean
dishes with his knowledge of Korean and non-Korean cuisines. Also, he only used
one refrigerator in his house instead of two to encourage his son to have Korean
food. He strongly believed that Korean food was a crucial carrier of Korean
culture and a connection between Korean-American to their ethnic root. His
parents died early, so the duty of cultivating his son Korean culture became a
hard responsibility for him and his wife.
As for my own experience, “fried eggs with tomatoes” is always one
of my favorite Chinese dishes, which is also my father’s best dish. First,
scramble the eggs and cut the tomatoes into small pieces; second, mix and fry
eggs and tomatoes; then, put some sault into them. It is not so difficult but
will often remind me of my father when I am studying abroad. Therefore, “fried
eggs with tomatoes” could be considered as the connection between my father and
me.
