Bihun-my comfort food

Whenever I return home from college there are many foods that I miss but there is one dish I know will be waiting for me when I get there-bihun. It is such a simple dish with easily attainable ingredients, little preparation that can be eaten hot or cold. Whenever my cousin Yiwen returns to the States for a visit, or my cousin Hsin-Yi comes home from Milwaukee, or if my A-ma and A-Kong pick my family up from the Airport or basically whenever I get together for a home-cooked meal at either my A-Ma or Kim-Po’s house there is always plenty enough to eat then and two days later. This dish means home and family and holds a special place in my heart.

Bihun is relatively easy to make and even I have been able to make it although it does not taste the same as Kim-Po’s cooking. When I first consulted my mom the first time that I prepared it she didn’t really have an exact recipe for me to follow. It’s just one of those things that you just know how to make it. The ingredients can vary but we usually make it in one particular way.
The recipe looks like this:
1-package rice stick noodles
1-2 green onions
1 handful Chinese chives
< ½ cup (about 5-6) dried black (shitake) mushrooms
½ cup chopped cabbage
1 cup of shredded carrots
¼ pound minced pork
1 handful of dried shrimps
Soy sauce
White pepper
Water
Oil

The rice stick noodles, dried shrimp and dried mushrooms are all soaked in separate containers with enough water for them to moisten. The Chinese chives and green onions are finely chopped and sautéed with the dried shrimps in a wok. The shitake mushrooms are chopped and added to the wok along with shredded carrots chopped cabbage and minced pork. After these ingredients have been cooked for a while the rice stick noodles are added and the mixture is cooked. Soy sauce and white pepper are added to taste. The noodles have now become a very light brown.

The process involved in preparing bihun is nothing out of the ordinary nor is there any elaborate ritual that is performed before eating it. Typically the experience and memories that I have eating this dish are sitting at the large, plastic tablecloth covered dinning table at Ku-Kong and Kim-Po’s house along with several other members of my mom’s family. My A-Kong or my father offers to say grace. Then everyone closes their eyes with their hands in their laps and we say amen in unison. Another male in the family says, “cha pong” (let’s eat) and passes around beer for all the adults. The bihun is usually served in a very large bowl and people dish it out themselves onto their own plate. We eat with long, slippery, plastic chopsticks. You can tell who needs another serving when you hear the plastic chopsticks scrape against the plastic plates when someone is trying to get the last bit of noodles and vegetables off of their plate and into their mouth. No one at the table spares anyone bad manners. People talk with their mouth open, put plates up to their face to scoop food into their mouths, and talk loudly. There is no doubt that this is my family and everyone is comfortable around each other.

When my mother and I take home leftovers we have a different ritual. Typically it is two or four in the afternoon on a Saturday and my mom and I haven’t eaten lunch yet. All we do is pull the food out of the refrigerator, put it on small plates, grab chopsticks and sit on the couch watching television and talking.

It’s true that this dish is nothing particularly special in presentation, preparation or ingredients but that is precisely what I love about it and why it holds such a dear place in my heat. It’s a dish that is comforting and whenever it is made it means that my family is getting together for dinner. Bihun makes me think of talking with family, watching Asian television, eating fruit with salt sprinkled on it, and drinking fresh brewed, hot oolong tea.

Often the most simplest and humblest dishes are the ones that are truly made from the heart and hold special meaning. Bihun is made to welcome someone home when they are too tired to make their own dinner, if you are just stopping by or made to be accompanied by other dishes at a larger dinner. For me bihun means seeing my cousins who now live far away. Even though I go for long periods of time when I don’t see different members of my family I know what’s in store when my mom calls me and says A-Ma’s making bihun.