Craving the taste
Tastes Like Home
By Cynthia Nelson
Stabroek News
January 13, 2007
Hi Everyone,
The aroma of 'married-man pork' (sweet basil) and thyme fills the kitchen as I lift the lid of the steamer. Gently, I place the black pudding I had reheated onto a plate, slicing it and adding some sour. It is as fresh as the day it was delivered - a little over a week ago. I sit down to eat.
I put the first piece into my mouth and as I chew, I cast my mind back to my mother's house where everyone would gather, each with a little plate full of black pudding, the house would be quiet as mouths were full and chewing. Every now and then, a comment was made about how good the black pudding tasted; someone asking if there's more; people eyeing the plates of those, like me, who are slow eaters. If you spotted someone staring, you pulled the plate closer to your chest.
I laugh now as I put another piece of black pudding into my mouth because I do not have to share mine with anyone. I can eat to my heart's content. But by the third piece, the black pudding is losing its taste - not that it has gotten cold or that it is flavourless but because the atmosphere that made it so attractive, so tasty, and so desirable was no longer there. In some way, it had lost its appeal.
In many ways, taste is relative; taste is subjective. Taste is not just the physical reaction to something in our mouths or the sensation created by having something in our mouths, often, taste is atmospheric, environmental and yes, psychological.
The creation of a distinctive mood (atmospheric) influences our taste. The surroundings and conditions in which we live and operate (environmental) contribute to our sense of taste. The way our minds function (psychological) impacts our taste. And these are the factors that contribute to our missing food from home. Let's face it, in New York there are large West Indian Markets, London, and yes in many other cities where there are large populations of Caribbean people. If you're a Guyanese living in Trinidad it is almost as if you're home. Here in Barbados, we can get quite a few staples from home. What is it then that makes those of us living abroad crave the foods of home? It is the atmosphere and the environment that plays on our minds.
The black pudding and souse is spicier when you're having it at your favourite 'black pudding lady' surrounded by friends and drinking a beer. The dhal is tastier when you're drinking it at Shanta's. The fried fish is hot and fresh when eating it at the White Castle Fish Shop after work. If you live in the country, there is nothing quite like sitting on the steps and eating. Get the picture? It is the company we long for, the shop at the corner, the vendor who sells only on Saturdays; the family we miss.
I always marvelled at some things:
Have you ever noticed how the food you buy as takeout tastes different than if you were eating it right there at the restaurant, shop or snackette? I remember how much sweeter, juicer and refreshing the cane juice would be at Bourda Market after lugging around shopping bags for about an hour; the juice we ordered to take home never seemed to taste the same way.
At school we would buy green mango with pepper and salt and this thing tasted so good. One mango never seemed to be enough and if you shared it with a friend, there was always a debate about who was going to get the seed. The salt and pepper was like no other - raw pepper ground into the salt so you could see flecks here and there. Mommy would buy green mangoes for us. My sister, Pat, would prepare the pepper and salt (often with pepper sauce). We'd race to peel a mango and after a slice each, we would give up on the mango - it did not taste as nice as the 'mango lady's' at school.
Then there was the Chinese fried rice and cucumber. Whenever we bought Chinese food the quarrel was always over the cucumber - not the meat or the rice but the slice of cucumber. We always ended up dividing it between us. Being the smart women that we are, we decided that whenever we were going to order Chinese food that we would cut up cucumbers in advance, that way we would not have to delay the process of eating. The food would arrive and we would each have more than enough cucumbers but did it taste the same as the one that came with the food? No way!
In some ways, we can never perfectly capture those wonderful tastes from our past. They are memories caught up in the moment, in the place, in the people. And that is true whether we live home in Guyana or we live abroad. Still, we can savour those memories in our minds. And we can enjoy the adventure of making new taste memories such as, where is the new hang out snack spot in GT? Who is the new 'souse lady'? Or what is it like to explore the tastes of our new homes in Boston, Brixton or Bridgetown? And what is it like to experience good ole Guyanese black pudding whilst sitting in my apartment in Barbados? Well that last one I can answer right now, excuse me a moment…Mmmmm, just as I thought, it's delicious!
Cynthia
tasteslikehome@gmail.com
Blog: www.tastesofguyana.blogspot.com