T O D A Y

Drama Queen candidates
Gag me

Contestant No. 1
Contestant No. 2
Contestant No. 3

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R E C E N T L Y

I want your sex
By Lisa Moskowitz
Forays into sex selection could result in a nation of girls
(09/15/98)

Words that sing
By Polly Shulman
Children's books that make words sing
(09/14/98)

We're here, we're ... uh ... straight?
By Sallie Tisdale
Using prayer, therapy and makeup to help gays "return" to heterosexuality
(09/11/98)

Rain on the parade
By Jeffrey Obser
Youth march or media circus?
(09/10/98)

Monica's betrayal
By Jenn Shreve
When Monica Lewinsky told more than all, she sold her man down the river -- and violated the adulterer's code of honor
(09/09/98)

ARCHIVES

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Mamafesto
By Camille Peri
Why it's time
for Mothers Who Think

Cross-cultural mutations
By Yunah Kim

Sure I've had green beans cut on the bias and topped with heavy cream and Durkee "frenched" onion bits. I've tasted the Korean version of Japanese futomaki rolls soggier than matzo in rain. I've even had a hand in some winners myself, like a very rare roast chicken I served floating in a pond of melted goat cheese logs. But nothing I've seen on Main Street, USA, or Seoul, Korea, even comes close to the cross-cultural mutations that emerged from the almost Americanized Asian kitchens that I toured as a child.

These mutations emerged from that zone where over-ambitious Korean mother meets Campbell's soup recipe, where Horlick's powdered milk sits next to cubed kim chee (giant white radish diced and fermented with lots of red pepper). It's about that culinary border where everything gets mixed up.

Growing up in Queens, N.Y., I saw a lot of Asian-American kitchens after school. After you made the rounds once, you knew what to expect snack-wise from each mom. There was the assimilated third generation Chinese family that used forks rather than chopsticks. That mom offered glasses of milk that came from a cow -- not soybeans -- and Chips Ahoy, not almond cookies. One of my friends, Ayako, was Japanese. Once, when I went over to her house, her mom got to work right away separating about 20 chicken wings into peglegs and shoulders, paring back the meat from each limb into a nice fleshy bite. After they marinated in soy sauce and sake, the miniature chicken legs were dipped in crispy Japanese bread crumbs, fried up fast and served with a thick sweet sauce. I never said no when Ayako invited me over.

While the Chinese and Japanese households handled culinary assimilation rather well, it was the Korean moms I knew who were caught in a culinary warp. They had been in the United States long enough to be touched by images of the American domestic goddess, but not quite long enough to use salt instead of soy sauce. They were familiar with Spam, Heinz ketchup and Hershey's chocolate bars courtesy of the U.S. Army. They came to this country to love Lucy and wonder about the housekeeper in "The Courtship of Eddie's Father." But they'd never seen an artichoke or an avocado, luncheon meat or individually wrapped snack packages.

Mrs. B was my friend Jane's mom. She was a Martha Stewart fan before Martha moved out of Jersey. As an after-school snack she once served a batch of asparagus, sprinkled with bits of hard boiled egg, a civilized vinaigrette on the side. Her Korean fare was standard, nothing to rival my mom's productions, but Mrs. B was creative and that's when the snacks got funky. One day, I went over to Jane B's house, prepared for either caviar or maybe some blandish mandoo (Korean dumplings). There were steaming bowls of rice on her kitchen table -- Korean rice, which is very sticky. Jane and I approached, kicking off shoes, throwing off bookbags, famished. At first I thought there was a crispy sesame seed topping on the rice. But tasting it, there was a familiar TV snack quality to the crunch. And the rice was weirdly creamy. Jane calmly gave name to the horror: rice mixed with Hellman's mayonnaise and sprinkled with crushed Lay's potato chips -- her dad's new favorite snack.

The zone. Some moms may do the Polynesian surprise or the mystery meatloaf, but beware the mom who's got the electric rice cooker in one hand and a bottle of Russian dressing in the other. She's liable to slap some seaweed on a kaiser roll for brunch and expect you to eat it with chopsticks.
SALON | Sept. 16, 1998

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