Todd Porter - Bountiful : vegetable and fruit recipes inspired by our garden

Published in 2013 by Stewart, Tabori & Chang
An imprint of ABRAMS

Text copyright 2013 Todd Porter and Diane Cu
Photographs copyright 2013 Todd Porter and Diane Cu

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for and may be obtained from the Library of Congress.
ISBN: 978-1-61769-048-8

Editor: Dervla Kelly
Designer: Amy Sly
Production Manager: Tina Cameron

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To our grandmothers, and all who inspire us to love, cook, and bring together friends and family for raucous good times.

Contents

If you really want to make a friend, go to someones house the people who give you their food give you their heart.

Cesar Chavez

white on rice couple: our story

A GIRL FROM VIETNAM

With my first bite into an American cheeseburger, I was smitten. Though I was only about four years old, this food moment is still vivid for me. The taste of that thin, floppy burger was so different from my regular regimen of rice and noodles. And the pickleoh, that soggy, briny thing was just wonderful; I had always had an addiction to anything sour, so that pickle laced with tart mustard and sweet ketchup was like candy. Then there was the cheese: That melted-yellow creaminess on top of the meat was super-decadent and satisfying. My cheeks swelled with delight and my belly was instantly in love.

Beyond just the burger, that meal ignited an awareness of the world of food beyond my mothers everyday kitchen fare of white rice, fresh vegetables, fish, pho noodles, and more fish.

Vietnamese food was what I was born into. The pulse and heartbeat of what resonates in my soul and fills my pantry are the flavors defined by growing up Vietnamese: spicy, salty, sour, sweet, and savorywith plenty of liquid-gold fish sauce.

I was born in Da-Nang in 1972, and my childhood world was consumed by stories of the Vietnamese war: of conflict, of suffering, of loss, and of how little food there was to eat. I was taught to eat everything off my plate, because every grain of white rice was made out of love and sacrifice.

Again and again, every conversation and bit of wisdom ended up with a lesson in food. Whether it was a reminder that people are starving in the world or a pointer on how I could have pounded the lemongrass finer, I was schooled through food.

Im grateful for those reminders now, as an adult. Ask me how grateful I was back then, as a third-grader, and Id probably tell you that all I wanted for dinner was a pepperoni pizza. (Oh, why not? Rice again?) But now Im so grateful for everything my parents have given me that it almost hurts.

In 1975, when I was two-and-a-half years old and Mom was three months pregnant with my brother, we fled Da-Nang along with my uncle and paternal grandmother. Like so many other Vietnamese families during that treacherous time, we fled, ran for our lives, hid, then made it onto a boat: a very big boat packed tight with frightened people. We floated on the open ocean, without fresh water and with scarcely any food; babies screamed, adults cried, and lives were lost. We eventually ended up in a refugee camp in Guam. My father was in the South Vietnamese navy and fought alongside the American forces. He was separated from us during our escape, but thankfully we were all reunited at that refugee camp.

Thats how I remember describing the experience to my schoolteachers in third grade. My English vocabulary was very limited back then, but thats pretty much how I shared the story. I often like to draw back on my third-grade jabber because, quite frankly, its less graphic and painful than what really went on. The rawer, more truthful memories I inherited from Mom are only for times when I have a bottle of bourbon by my side.

After a few months in the refugee camp, we came to America and went to live with my aunt, who was married to an American soldier and already living in the States. Since 1975, my parents have relieved me of my only-child status by adding five more siblings to my big-sister rsum. Growing up in a family of six kids meant having to share, explore, study, sleep, drink, and sometimes even shower as a group. But most important of all, it meant cooking and eating together.

Mom and Dad were infatuated with food, and they now had six kids in their arsenal of free labor for growing, cooking, and executing their crazy food parties. We were always asked to participate in household cooking chores (or, in our eyes, torture-pain-suffering), and no video games were permitted until we were finished. As a fourth-grader, I was not happy.

Actually, my parents were more than infatuated; they were possessed. They tore up the backyard patch of green grass to grow a mini vegetable farm. With the help of six kids, they were able to grow and harvest fresh vegetables, lush Asian greens, and loads of fresh herbs. Each child was born into the role of a line-cook. I helmed lemongrass pounding at the mortar and pestle and manned the shrimp-peeling station. My younger siblings fulfilled their respective roles as garlic masher, shallot peeler, herb washer, eggplant picker, and lime squeezer with civic duty.

I had a lovehate relationship with food when I was growing up because preparing it was always so complicated and time consuming. Food had to be fresh, because thats the only way my parents knew how to feed us. If we were hungry, we had to grow the food, pick it, wash it, then cook it. It was beyond my understanding that some of my American friends had it as easy as buying dinner at a fast-food restaurant or cooking a ready-made boxed meal. I was seething with jealousy every time I had to prep for my parents fried-fish dinners.

My love of heavy cheese dishes, fried chicken, burgers, pizza, Twinkies, and other junk food drove me to distraction when I had to eat rice, noodles, and fresh herbs and greens, again and again. I just wanted to have a soft, chewy chocolate chip cookie! My hunger was certainly satisfied by Vietnamese food and I was fulfilled with a bowl of noodles, but eating a burger or pizza meant that I was more American.

It wasnt until I moved away from home to the small town of Port Angeles, Washington, at the age of twenty-two and as a vegetarian, that I learned the value of the cooking I had been raised on. Living far away from my parents kitchen meant that I was able to eat all the cheese pizza and potato chips I wanted. At first, it was a blessing not to have to peel and devein shrimp and be free from the throngs of the home kitchen.