Peng Min is a cook. The name of the private restaurant in Peng Min is "Slow Life". You need to make a reservation in advance to eat here. She only makes three tables every day, and when they are fully booked, she won't take orders that day.
Peng Min is more than just a cook. In Peng Min's heart, there is a small world. Yes, you can see her wonderful little world in every dish she cooks. Her love for life, her thinking and persistence in food are finally conveyed through the food she cooked. As long as you have eaten and seen it, you won't forget it, or as long as you have shaken her thin hand, you can feel the power of the warm and long-lost fingertips.
Peng Min said that her growth began with her understanding of the kitchen and food. When I was young, my mother seemed to be busy in the kitchen. She can always make delicious food, such as biscuits, baked cakes and fried pork slices with bamboo shoots. For a long time in adolescence, her relationship with her mother was tense and she always yearned for the outside world. Later, when her mother died, she took over the role of mother and became a mother herself. Starting from the small entrance of cooking, the more I do, the more I find that the world I can discover and understand is vast. There is really no need to do more business and go to more places.
Busy modern life, there is little time to calm down and cook a meal for yourself and your family. This is actually a great loss. In a society that eats out, there is no shortage of food. What is lacking most is the quality of slow life. If you want to do it well, you have to pay attention to the process, and you can't rush it, otherwise you have to start over. Need fine knife work, can't rush to the next chapter. Therefore, the process of cooking is a practice of slow life, which makes people cultivate rhythm and rhythm. In this society that pursues efficiency and quick success, the kitchen is the best place to practice.
Today's Peng Min, following his own heart, constantly transforms intangible thoughts into tangible thoughts, establishes the emotional connection between food and himself, and has always maintained a rich and meticulous sensibility. She said that only in this way can she become a good cook.
One rainy afternoon, we had an in-depth exchange. A woman opens her heart to another woman without reservation, telling her past and her growth, which requires opportunities and a mysterious force. Fortunately, that ignorant and immature girl has now become a wise mother. I don't think Peng Min's daughter should be so confused and helpless when growing up, because she took this road by herself. But it seems that some people have said that youth is to make mistakes and get hurt constantly, so that you can grow up. Otherwise, how can it be called youth?
one
When his mother left, Peng Min was scared.
When she was in her twenties, she wandered around the motherland as soon as she graduated from Peng Min University. At that time, she just wanted to leave her mother. There is hatred in her heart and self-sufficiency in her inner world. Sometimes I get a little nervous, and I've been to scary places, but I've never been so scared. She knows that she is a person without a mother. Her mother is her last barrier in this world. From then on, she had to face the world alone. Knowing this, she was afraid.
Mother passed away last Thursday. When Peng Min returned to Dongguan from Yunnan, his mother was dying. Peng Min knelt in front of the bed and grabbed her hand, regretting why she didn't come back earlier. Mom is lying in the quilt, a small ball. The illness made her thinner and thinner. At the moment, she looked straight at Peng Min and couldn't say anything. Peng Min saw that the person who loved her the most in the world slowly lost her breath. She can no longer hear her nagging and eat her cooking.
Many days after the funeral, Peng Min couldn't accept the fact that his mother had died. Walking in the street, she will cry in public, because she thinks her mother is gone; When friends come to see her gossip, she will cry without warning. ...
After all, love lasts longer than hate. After her mother died, Peng Min realized that their reconciliation was more important to her than her mother.
Stay at my mother's house. She hasn't been downstairs for days. She was so hungry that she went to the kitchen to see what she could do. There are polished knives and pans on the dining table, and large and small pots are neat.
Everything in the kitchen is quietly recording my mother's long life. Peng Min doesn't know why kitchens are inherently feminine. When she was young, she never thought about what she would do in the kitchen. Fate is perverse, reincarnation, experienced a bizarre youth, gradually getting old, she naturally understood what her mother meant. At that time, she didn't think about it. At that time, she naturally walked into the kitchen like her mother.
The porcelain in the kitchen is elegant and shiny. It has a variety of curved radians and white colors, and shines with exquisite dense porcelain light in the dusk. There are two bottles of red wine and pure blackcurrant on the stage, and the bottleneck is slender. The flame on the stove is shining and transparent under the light, and the smell of stew overflows into the iron grate below. Bang, the aroma is mellow and floating, and a room full of white smoke rises. In a trance, it seems that mother is still cooking delicious food in the kitchen. ...
At that moment, Peng Min knew there was a way to be her mother again, go into the kitchen and cook according to her recipes. Her small ribs and braised fish-they will become doorways, allowing her to walk into the past that she almost forgot and into the past that she forced herself to forget. Food is the most evocative-remembering certain smells in the kitchen, combined with certain smells, may make her go back to childhood at once.
My mother's death completely changed Peng Min. She grew long hair, got rid of the bar in Dali and moved back to the house where her mother lived.
Slow Life was written by Peng Min to be closer to his mother and more like her. My mother was a cook, and finally she became a cook. She thinks this is a kind of fate. Once she thought that she and her mother were different people and would take different paths, but in fact, how could it be? Fate has mysterious power. Now it seems that between Peng Min and her mother, it is more of a cycle of life.
two
His father died very early, and Peng Min lived alone with his mother since childhood. My mother has no fixed job and works in a factory, and her life is very embarrassing. Mom knows that she cooked delicious food. At first, she made a box lunch at home and sent it to a small factory nearby to earn some hard money. After saving some money, she rented a facade and opened a snack bar. Although the shop is small, it has everything, such as noodles, steamed stuffed buns, stir-fried dishes, duck blood vermicelli soup and so on. My mother is ingenious and sells a lot of things while learning.
Customers are mostly nearby residents and factory workers. In the first half of the month, business was ups and downs, and income was not very stable. My mother always insisted. She is eloquent, dignified and quiet, and tidies up neatly every day. Most of the repeat customers in the store are men. Mother knows this well. Since it is a man's business, we should highlight the characteristics of women. She giggles all day, the soup is clean, the shop is clean, making men happy to pay the bill. When Peng Min went to the store to help, she pushed Peng Min to the front, greeted customers, served tea, poured water and did some work as a waiter. Business in this restaurant is getting better and better. To put it bluntly, my mother just took advantage of the subtle relationship between men and women. She is familiar with this place and always has a good proper limit. She used this thing, but she doesn't seem to have wet shoes. The mystery here, mom didn't say, Peng Min also don't want to say more. She knows what her mother thinks. At that time, she sympathized with her mother and hated her. Her feelings for her mother are always contradictory.
Only when the door is closed at night does my mother look tired, and the beauty of the day disappears and looks old. At dawn the next day, my mother was still alive and beautiful. The dining room is like a stage and a magic mirror. A mother during the day and a mother at night are like two people.
In Peng Min's memory, my mother used to like cooking and spending time in the kitchen. Sometimes she will spend a day studying recipes, buying special ingredients, cutting on the mat and making delicious meals. She may not have thought that she would make a living by it, but think about it, it makes her more comfortable. Mother often nags that food is the most important thing for people. She thinks eating in China is the most important thing.
Young Peng Min didn't take her mother's words to heart. She feels that the chef class, from women to chefs, has never been promoted. The so-called gentleman is far away from cooking, and even the kitchen has been relegated to a simple and low space. Modern women regard leaving the kitchen as their greatest ambition in life.
Mother hasn't read many books, but she can't beat Peng Min. Her mother wanted to teach her how to cook, which made her very disgusted. She doesn't want to live like her mother. But my mother said, I don't want you to learn to serve men, but I want you to cook yourself a delicious meal when you are away from home and homesick! At that time, Peng Min felt that what she wanted was a higher level of life, and would not be bothered by these mother-in-law emotions. Peng Min didn't like going into the kitchen since he was a child, and he didn't like his mother in the kitchen. She thinks her mother is trivial and careless. She thinks her mother is an old-fashioned woman, and she is a post-80 s, new woman.
When did Peng Min begin to hate his mother? When my mother opened a restaurant, when my mother asked her to learn to cook, or earlier, it should be the time when men began to appear. Peng Min can't remember the exact time. She remembers that the man often came to his mother's restaurant for a summer, and left just after eating; Later, I sat down and asked for two side dishes, drank a bottle of Erguotou and sat alone. After a long time, a bottle bottomed out and still sat still. Later, he will help his mother buy food and take care of the backyard. This thin and taciturn man often comes to see his mother, but he has never said anything.
Peng Min could see that his mother liked him. Otherwise, her mother wouldn't suddenly be at a loss under the gaze of Peng Min, and her smile on her face became shy, mixed with a hint of flattery. Now that I think about it, Peng Min can't say what she hates about him. Maybe it's because she has never had a father, doesn't know how to get along with an adult male, and can't accept the sudden addition of a man between their mother and daughter.
Peng Min in her girlhood was sensitive and self-respecting. She subconsciously longed for her father's love, but she also resisted this strange emotion. In high school, her mother sent Peng Min to an aristocratic boarding school. Mother said that she always wanted to give Peng Min the best, but Peng Min was ungrateful.
Peng Min thinks her mother is trying to create a world for herself. She gets in the way at home and interferes with their lives, even though her mother never takes him home. He works as a manager in a factory, and his economic conditions are quite good. He has his own house. Now I think my mother has always cared about Peng Min's feelings, but Peng Min, who is in a rebellious period, is increasingly alienated from her mother.
When Peng Min 17 years old was hospitalized for liver disease in the summer, Peng Min saw his mother cooking soup for him in the kitchen and then sent him to the hospital. His mother served him tea, poured water, cooked and washed clothes for three months, and his mother closed the shop for three months. All this made Peng Min unhappy. She felt that her mother cared more about him.
Later, Peng Min read a sentence in Zhang Ailing's novel Lust, Caution, that a man's heart passes through his stomach first. It means to control a person, first of all, to control his stomach. At that time, she couldn't understand, as smart as Zhang Ailing, how could she understand the relationship between men and women like her mother, a housewife?
Peng Min went to college in Guangzhou to study jewelry design. She applied for this major on a whim. After studying for four years, she has never had the urge to design a piece of jewelry, nor does she want to work in the jewelry field. Although Guangzhou is close to home, Peng Min seldom goes home. She felt that since her mother remarried, there was no need to go home.
After graduation, Peng Min stayed at home for three months. Her mother asked her to help in the restaurant, but she insisted on not going. She listens to music in bed with headphones on every day, or watches movies on the computer. Mother tried to talk to her and wanted to know what she was thinking. She is always busy, and she is driven to be anxious. She said there was nothing to say and she didn't know what she really wanted to do.
On the afternoon of leaving, my mother stayed at home with her. Peng Min packed his bags and walked more and more slowly. She knew that her mother was looking at her, but she didn't look at her. She wants her to feel firm. Finally, my mother said, it doesn't matter if you go out for a walk when you are young, but you should know how to protect yourself, don't be too headstrong, and eat well ... Peng Min was annoyed when she heard it. So it's so important to eat well? The world is big, there are many meaningful things, and it is not a matter of eating.
The bird just came out of the cage and kept barking. It's a big world outside, Peng Min sighed and was surprised. She went to Beijing first, and went to 798 Factory and Maoer Hutong. The bar in Sanlitun made her linger, but she didn't have much money in her pocket, so she thought of looking for a job. I didn't study jewelry design in college. College graduates can be found everywhere in Beijing. Promoters in shopping malls, flyers on the street, waiters in bars, the best job is just to be a clerk in the company. Peng Min has done many jobs, and each job didn't last long, and he didn't earn any money. He lives in the basement, and there is no bathroom in the room, so he can only go to the public bathroom at the other end of the corridor to relieve himself. When I first arrived, the excitement lasted less than half a year, and the breadth and alienation of Beijing soon puzzled Peng Min. It's hard to work, and she also realized what the lyrics say, it's easy to work, difficult to make money, easy to fall in love and difficult to get married. ...
That day was the first 1 1 month that Peng Min came to Shanghai from Beijing. It rained 47 times, my stomach ached 8 times, I made 6 friends, changed 3 jobs, and fell out of love 1 time. The weather suddenly changed before coming off work, and Peng Min's eyes became dull due to hard work. Peng Min looked blankly out of the window. Lightning that lit up the sky quickly pulled her back from her trance. Looking down, the lights came on and night began to fall. The street trees downstairs were shaken by the wind, and the glass rolled and made a dull sound.
Peng Min left the company with a heavy heart. It is said that hunger and lack of sleep are the biggest demons, yes. Peng Min, with dark eyes, was walking on the subway in the dark. The voices of talking on the phone, chatting and scolding children in the carriage hummed together, tearing her nerves hard. Peng Min was tired, and her body and brain humbly asked for a hot meal and a good sleep. Sleepy and annoyed, she remembered what her mother said, and it didn't seem so hard to accept. After all, eating well will make her feel good. I wonder how her mother is now.
At home, Peng Min collapsed on the sofa and pressed his aching stomach hard. When she got up to look for pills, she glanced at herself in the mirror-after eating fast food for almost a year, I don't know when she began to grow a "takeaway face" with a shiny face, large pores and anemia.
At one time, the daily meal was the hardest time for her. Going to those shops for dinner is boring. I hesitated for a long time, and finally I couldn't jump out of the customary choice. Although the company is not far from home, it is enough to grab a few lunches every day because it is too lazy to cook. I said to myself a thousand times, "start cooking by myself tomorrow", but the vicious circle continued the next day.
Life often begins to collapse because of a small move. Of course, when we are deeply involved, we often don't see a breakthrough.
three
When I came home from the National Day holiday, my mother looked at Peng Min's emaciated appearance and felt very distressed. She kept rubbing her back with her palm and gently told her, "A person should eat a good meal and don't spoil his stomach. Health is the capital of revolution. What can be more important than eating well? "
Mother is old and not as flexible as in previous years, but she still studies recipes at home all day, just making them for herself and him. When my mother is old, she is no longer so glamorous, but adds a homely warmth. She went for a walk in the park with him. In the hall, he carefully put on a scarf and gloves for her, and she went to the square dance with him. He gave her a handbag. Peng Min looked at the way he took care of his mother. He didn't hate him so much.
In those days, Peng Min followed her mother to the market to buy food, and colorful fruits and vegetables came into view, which actually cured her gloomy mood. It was also during that time that her dull taste buds were slowly awakened. She began to understand that the food she spent money on was really completely different from the food she spent time cooking.
Only then can the young heart settle down. It is the dream of many young women in literature and art to go to a small town and find someone to live a warm life. After the holiday, Peng Min wanted to go to Yunnan, but his mother didn't stop him. She knew it was useless to stop him. Mom said you were always like this when you were young. Come back when you are tired. Although Peng Min still disapproves of her mother's words, she no longer talks back to her mother.
After wandering in Dali for half a month, Peng Min came to Lijiang again. In Lijiang, I shared a small house with my new friend. There was nothing in the kitchen except a rice cooker I had brought before. The rice cooker was bought in Dali in April to cook porridge and nourish the stomach. Occasionally, it will be used to cook noodles and make bibimbap. After renting the new house for a week or two, they still only have one rice cooker. However, in order to celebrate her new boyfriend's birthday, Peng Min tried to make a brown sugar cake from this broken jar according to an online recipe. Although it looks and tastes like a cake, it tastes good. Peng Min took a photo and sent it to a circle of friends. Her mother praised her. Mother has been paying attention to her movements and often leaves her messages to let her have a good meal.
Peng Min was in love with a singer with long hair, and the singer was destined to wander, so the singer's woman could not settle down. Peng Min's cooking skills have soared because the singer likes sweets and home cooking. After the brown sugar cake was praised, Peng Min was greatly encouraged. He spent more than half an hour beating milk bubbles, and his arm was sour and his mood was sweet. As a result, the rice cooker failed to satisfy Peng Min. She bought a Korean frying pan on Taobao, which can be used when plugged in. Then Peng Min's daily website changed from Mushroom Street to kitchen. Before going to work every day, she must search for a home-cooked dish from it, and then go to the vegetable market happily.
During that time, she often called her mother, mainly to ask about some dishes. Do you want to fry the ribs with water first? Do you want to add salt to fried pork liver ... Although her communication with her mother is mainly about cooking, her mother is still happy to tell her what to say. Finally, she said, mom, I'm going to cook. It's too late. Mother just hung up the phone disgruntled. She can feel that her mother wants to talk to her for a while, but she always feels that it is still too late to listen to her mother's nagging and her boyfriend will come back for dinner. At that time, her singer boyfriend ranked first in the world, and her mother was naturally behind.
She bought a Supor frying pan on the Double Eleven special. Since then, she has been making pancakes with Peng Min's most popular Aauto Quicker. Pumpkin cake, egg cake, potato egg cake, etc. Never tired. At first, they were not very delicious. Sometimes the potato omelet has too much flour and too little pepper, but the long-haired singer still eats it all. The whole singer licked his fingers and said that only love and food can be worthy.
four
When Peng Min fell in love with the long-haired singer, his mother died unexpectedly. The sudden heart attack passed without warning, and her mother called her in tears. It is difficult for young people in love to feel the pain of widowhood. Peng Min asked his mother to close the restaurant and come to Yunnan to find herself, see the beautiful scenery and relax. Peng Min also said many words of comfort, but these words, even Peng Min's own voice, sounded like scratching his boots. Besides, who can bear the pain of losing a lover instead of who?
Some things only hurt when you have experienced them. It was not until the long-haired singer fell in love with someone else and left the Lijiang River that Peng Min gradually realized the pain of his mother losing her lover. Wandering singers have to wander after all. Even though Peng Min already knows what he likes and dislikes, what if he controls his stomach? I need spiritual understanding, not a chef, the singer with long hair told her when she left.
In just one month, Peng Min lost six kilograms, leaving only a pair of big eyes without god in her little face, which made people sad. My mother called her many times to go home, but she didn't go back. In desperation, my mother came to the small house she rented in Lijiang. My mother looked at her without words, lost weight, and couldn't speak with tears. Peng Min watched her mother tidy up the room, clean up and cook porridge. She was too busy to talk.
Mother tidied up the kitchen neatly, moved a chair to Peng Min and watched her cook. If you really don't want to talk, then don't talk. No matter who you are, you shouldn't abuse yourself. You should start cooking for yourself. You can't always be hungry. Just eat enough. Communicating with things is much more comfortable than interacting with people. In the kitchen, all kinds of ingredients will talk and play with themselves in their own kitchen world. You see, it's much easier to communicate with them, which can make you feel more secure. This is also a way of loving life, and I will love myself more ... Mom is talking to Peng Min while working, which is more like talking to herself.
Conversation is the beginning of healing. Even a person wants to eat every meal well, and also wants to clean up the dining table before meals, put a vase with simple design and insert a fresh rose in it. You are the most important thing. If you are not good to yourself, who else will be good to you ... When her mother speaks, Peng Min's eyes are moist.
Mother dragged her to the vegetable market, and the morning market was the busiest time until lunch. At that time, everyone had three heads and six arms. There were too many cooks, and Wu Yao drank six. Young people are anxious. He gave the first person change with his left hand, picked vegetables for the second person with his right hand, and greeted the third person in his mouth. Sounds like a fight. In a hurry, he patted his head and said, "Wrong fucking change again!"
The old shop is much easier. Their eyelids droop and they don't look at the customers in front of them. Instead, they listen to one, count two, accept three, open their eyes and listen to all directions, glance at the scales, and they are already chatting with acquaintances, not forgetting their wittiness. It is said that southerners are petty and abacus is loud, at least for vendors. The accounts are all in the old man's mind, not disorderly. Meditate a little at most, and spit out numbers fluently is like pouring large and small pearls into a plate of jade.
Watermelon sellers open half or cut some triangular pieces, and the green skin and red flesh are very attractive; The grape seller picked colorful flowers and put them on the shelf, sprinkling some water. Like a beautiful woman with heavy makeup and attractive hue. It's just that there are no princes and grandchildren in the vegetable market. They just "I'll try first". Aauto Quicker, a big mouth tasting in the vegetable market, bought bayberry, first picked the big one to eat and chewed corn. If you are not careful, half of it will be gone.
After nightfall, the people in the vegetable market went to the stalls and became a snack street in the night market. In the past, when the all-powerful and invincible food stalls of fried rice and noodles were not booming, the snacks in the night market were basically instant soups such as tofu pudding and wonton, with some snacks such as radish cakes and fried dumplings. Vendors who are far away from home often solve their diet on the spot. The uncle who sells prickly heat and the uncle who sells tofu sit side by side. You handed the prickly heat, I took a bowl of tofu, and we talked while eating. ...
Sometimes when I don't buy food, my mother will take Peng Min up to visit the vegetable market, smelling the fishy smell, the smell of leaves, raw meat, baked cakes, radish cakes, stinky tofu and cheap perfume, listening to the shouts, the sound of cutting meat, the clatter of fishmongers' tanks, the voice of truck drivers shouting "Let's give in", the cries of children, and watching the surging crowds and white gas floating above the vegetable market.
Gu Long wrote that if a person is desperate and wants to commit suicide, let him go to the vegetable market. That is to say, as soon as he enters the food market, this person will definitely forget his distractions and regain his love for life-this is somewhat exaggerated, but the meaning is correct.
In this way, I go for a walk in the vegetable market every day and then go home to the kitchen, and my mood becomes different. When cleaning the ingredients by the pool, my mood seems to have been washed away and become comfortable and refreshing. When I carefully cut vegetables and cook, when I concentrate, my heart seems to be empty, thinking nothing, and full of everything.
Mother and daughter are absorbed in cooking dinner in the dim light of the kitchen. When the soup was served, Peng Min chewed every bite of food slowly, feeling the function of food and taste buds, and also feeling the mother's good intentions.
Mom told Peng Min that no matter how busy and tired you are, you should set aside some time to cook something delicious for yourself every day, that is, make noodles with clear water and mix with tomatoes and green leafy vegetables, so that you won't feel bored day after day.
Sharp tools can do a good job. Mother took Peng Min to the supermarket and chose exquisite and beautiful tableware. Mom said that good utensils will make people have the urge to cook, and it will be very pleasing to look at every day. Mom said that a man who is not suitable for you, just leave, the key is that you still have yourself. You should know what you want and meet the right man in the future. Until then, you should have a good meal.
She didn't understand what she wanted until she was in her thirties. Before that, she was in chaos for many years, passing by one man after another in the chaos, rich, poor, tacky, pretentious, featureless, eccentric, eager to go to bed at the first meeting, pointing fingers when drinking tea. None of them are suitable for her.
Later, she finally realized that the man she chose to be her husband was actually because of her mother. They dated for a while. The first time he went to her house, he was preparing to cook for her in her kitchen. When washing vegetables, he said, your kitchen is a little small. If we get married, I want a bigger kitchen with more complete appliances. She knows that he is serious about life, so she will be serious about her. A man who loves the kitchen will not be too bad to his wife. Peng Min got a man for cooking. Since then, every day has become orderly and full of little interests in life.
Jiang Xun, a master of aesthetics, said that "eating to the full" is absolutely not in line with the aesthetics of life. Eating tastefully and delicately should not be the only purpose of food. Eat a meal in a hurry and you don't love your life; But if you prepare and enjoy a meal in this way, you will love your life, because you feel that you have spent time and energy in your life, and you have prepared for it.
Peng Min recommended the film The Chef to me. She said it was a movie about delicious food. I remember the commentator read it out slowly: cooking is actually a change, which can turn soft into hard and cold into hot, but what can't be changed is from hate to love.
She burst into tears when she saw the film, but she didn't hate it. She loved her mother, which she felt strongly after her mother died. She wants to find the taste of her mother by cooking.
In the afternoon in the south, time passed quickly and Peng Min's daughter came back. This is a little girl with big eyes, quiet and a little clever. The outline and appearance of her face are a little similar to that of Peng Min. Seeing us talking, she sat down at the big table in the kitchen, fiddling with her schoolbag and some small things.
Peng Min tidied vegetables by the pool and stewed meat soup in the pot, telling me that was a thing of the past. The little girl is sitting at the table watching cartoons at the moment. The kitchen is full of white steam, the smell of meat, the smell of onion, ginger and garlic ... this scene is very familiar. More than 30 years ago, Peng Min was a little girl, and her mother cooked for her. The kitchen is full of the aroma of all kinds of food, the sound of cutting vegetables, cooking and cooking, and the busy figure of her mother. ...
Sponsored by local sports bureaus, organized by China Training Center of World Muay Thai Council, Guangdong Muay Thai King Sports Development Co., Ltd