Multicultural Holiday Meals

[skchai]

People have often noted how holiday dinners in Hawai`i often end up being complex fusion experiences. At least in our case, however, almost, but not quite. . .

We had about 30 people over for Thanksgiving, mostly my mom and her friends, with some of the younger generation as well. It was more or less potluck and here's what we ate (not including dessert): turkey with "Cajun" (sic) spice rub, stuffing with pine nuts and shiitake, fresh cranberry sauce with white peaches, cheongpo mook (mung bean jelly with spicy sauce), tottori mook (acorn jelly with similarly spicy sauce), nappa cabbage kimchi, spicy doraji (bellflower root) salad, ae hobak namul (cold seasoned zucchini), naengchae (cold salad of egg strips, pear, carrot, and radish with mustard sauce), chap chae (stir-fried bean thread noodle with beef and vegetables), saengseon jeon (pan-fried egg-dipped fish), baked ham, green salad with dried cranberries and walnuts, corn, and rice.

So it was a typical Korean-American holiday meal. However, it's really easy in to divvy up this menu into American and Korean dishes; nothing really East-West fusion except for perhaps the stuffing and (a stretch) the cranberry sauce. The desserts were mostly pies and cakes; no Korean desserts unless you count fruit. The guests brought so many pies that it seemed as if each person could have their own individual pie, but that's another story. There was this article in the New York Times about how immigrants adapt the preparation of Thanksgiving turkey according to their ethnic heritage, but that doesn't really seem like what happens with us. It's more like the contemporary Korean wedding ceremony - Korean and Western patterns side-by-side, no attempt to mix them except for the fact that they are consumed at the same time.

Here is a lousy picture - much of the food is not visible - I was too self-conscious about taking pictures of the food to frame the shot better and take more pictures. But you can see the kind of alternating Korean-American-Korean-American pattern to the array. The foreground dish is the cheongpo mook, with the tottori mook in the large square bowl next to the ham. The zucchini namul is in the smaller square container, and the kimchee and doraji are next to the turkey.

Any multicultural tales of Thanksgiving or other holidays to tell?

[FoodZealot]

Beautiful table, SK! I'll recount some from my family after I get a chance to finish writing it.

[caroline]

I agree, Sun-Ki, these meals do seem to be multi-cultural rather than inter-cultural. But the power of the turkey is impressive. When in Hawaii, I had a student who had arrived from mainland China in August. By November she was determined to cook a turkey for Thanksgiving. New to turkeys, new to ovens. Everyone in the department office chipped in with advice. She reported the following Monday that it was a wonderful success. I've always wondered just what that meal looked like,

Rachel

[skchai]

Rachel - the turkey is indeed such an essential part of the Thanksgiving celebration in the United States, which is, more than any other holiday I'm aware of, defined by the food that is eaten. Indeed, most kids would be hard put to remember anything about Pilgrim fathers and such, but focus entirely on eating turkey. So I guess it would not be surprising that immigrants who want to adopt the Thankgiving celebration should feel obligated to cook a turkey, like it or not, rather than the foods associated with the harvest / thanksgiving festivals of their own cultures.

Koreans have their own indigenous thanksgiving holiday, Chuseok, which is one of the high points of the year, yet immigrants choose to celebrate American Thanksgiving and Chuseok separately rather than making Thanksgiving into an alternative Chuseok. On the other hand, Canadians, at least to my experience, do not seem to feel a strong need to celebrate both Canadian and American Thanksgivings. While there are obviously a lot of factors involved in this, it suspect the differences in the reconcilability of food practices has something to do with it.

Tad - looking forward to your family holiday meal report!

[FoodZealot]

While I was growing up, the whole extended family would eat Thanksgiving at one aunt and uncle’s house, Christmas at our house, and New Year’s lunch at my great grandmother’s house, then dinner at another aunt and uncle’s house on the other side of the family.

Our Thanksgivings were pretty much like Sun-Ki’s, except my Mom's side is Okinawan/Japanese, not Korean. There wasn’t much actual fusion at our holidays either. We would have turkey, gravy, ham (canned - not my favorite), stuffing, mashed potatoes and such, right alongside platters of sashimi, tako (sliced octopus) with miso sauce, makizushi, inarizushi, steamed rice, potato salad, grilled or fried chicken of some kind, nishime (our family's was usually chicken, takenoko, araimo, carrots, etc, stewed with shoyu).

A small number were forays outside of this “norm,” probably due to statewide cooking shows and mini-fads from the potluck dinner circuit. For a few years, oven lau lau made with Frank’s Foods pork butt (like corned beef, but made with pork) and taro leaf would be made, or maybe Italian dressing-shoyu chicken.

Christmas was at our house, and would be more wide ranging and less traditional. My dad had been a cook in the Army, and was in charge of anything grilled, so he sometimes made char siu turkey or kalua turkey. I recall a few standing rib roasts as well. One of my grandmother’s showpiece dishes was shrimp in tarragon butter (she had worked garde-manger at the old Pineapple Room when it was still Liberty House, so she could cook some haole dishes). She would insist on doing it a la minute so that it was fresh, and it also worked out that hers was the last dish to come to the table, amidst oohs and ahhs.

New Year’s is a big deal for our family – more so than Christmas. On NY eve, my grandmother would make ozoni, her version of mochi soup with mizuna greens in a clam broth. We would burn firecrackers for good luck, and would either buy or receive the mochi and tangerine as a gift. For the lunch at my great grandmother’s house, it was tons of shrimp tempura, shoyu pork, beef teriyaki, steamed tai snappers, along with the standbys - platters of sashimi, tako with miso sauce, makizushi, inarizushi, steamed rice, potato salad. We ate around low folding tables, so there were several serving dishes of the same thing to minimize plate passing. One of my favorite desserts was a simple jello made with lilikoi. After that feast and more fireworks, it was off to see the other side of the family for dinner. They fished a lot, so they would have whole steamed onaga or opakapaka, or menpachi or aweoweo over somen noodles, along with their versions of the standbys.

In terms of food, it was a little better when I was very young, and not just because of nostalgia. The family was really into it, and all it was homemade. Later on, they didn't feel like cooking so much, and they would get catered Chinese food to augment the food we made ourselves. Food in recent years has been very good, but it’s still not the same without kids around. Nevertheless, I'm fortunate to have lots of happy food memories.

[skchai]

Tad - you had some great holidays. Thanks for remembering all the beautiful details to share with us. You're lucky to have grown up in a family that not only knew food but cared enough about it to develop family traditions for each holiday that everyone could remember.

oven lau lau made with Frank’s Foods pork butt (like corned beef, but made with pork) and taro leaf

that sounds real good . . . hmm. . . an idea ahead of its time. A cured pork butt would go real well with the slightly bitter luau leaf

Italian dressing-shoyu chicken

wow, what was that?

char siu turkey or kalua turkey

kalua turkey is something that is coming back - Kailua High School even set up a community imu for Thanksgiving where people could rent out spaces.

One thing that I love about local holiday traditions is that they're not just about the nuclear family - they involve the extended and hanai family, often mixing together the food traditions from the various branches.

Your mention of big sashimi platters reminds me that it's about time that the newspapers here will be starting their New Year's Ahi sashimi price watch. Have no idea what the prices are going to be this year but that's one holiday food custom that is distinctively and invariably part of Hawai`i culture.

[Marco_Polo]

Hi Sun-Ki

I've been meaning to reply to this wonderful post which I really enjoyed and thanks too for foodzealot's great recollections, too.

As you know, my grandmother came to Hawaii in 1924 as a picture bride and my mother was born in Honolulu. Both later moved to the mainland where I was raised (though I myself was born in Mexico, but that's another story). My grandmother ferociously clung to her Korean identity, but nonetheless her foods were always the most delicious fusion of flavours (I'm not just talking about Thanksgiving or holiday foods). For example she made something she called chop steak which was really a variation of chap chae, a meat and noodle medley, though 'haole' style, with much more meat. She made a delicious 'Irish' stew, meat braised like kalbi tchim with soy sauce and garlic and ginger but with carrots and potatoes. And of course we always enjoyed for breakfast the most delicious Korean pancakes - chewy, crepe-like pancakes served with maple syrup and butter, American style. What makes them Korean, I always wondered? My guess is that her batter is virtually the same as used to make jon, true Korean pancakes such as pa'jon etc, here adapted to American tastes. This to me is true fusion cooking!

So on holidays or every days, the foods I grew up eating were never really authentically Korean nor western: they were just home cooking, though no less delicious for that. And it seems to be the way we still cook ourselves. Just last night for example we had some nice sirloin steaks. Should I grill them and serve with a nicely reduced wine sauce? I know, I'll cut into strips, marinade like for bulgogi, then stir fry with tomatoes and onions and serve over shortgrain brown rice - a sort of Chinese-American beef tomato, but with a Korean accent - served together with a green salad.

It occurs to me from your post, Sun-Ki, that Hawaii as a meeting place of East and West encapsulates in many ways the melting pot that is America. And though I live halfway around the world from you, I too am very much a product of this delicious island reality.

Happy holidays to all, whatever delicious fusion of foods you'll be enjoying.

Marc

[FoodZealot]

oven lau lau made with Frank’s Foods pork butt (like corned beef, but made with pork) and taro leaf

that sounds real good . . . hmm. . . an idea ahead of its time. A cured pork butt would go real well with the slightly bitter luau leaf?

Italian dressing-shoyu chicken

wow, what was that?

Re: the lau lau, even though it's another kind of pork, I would normally expect to be a purist and go traditional with plain old pork butt. But the one made with cured pork is really, really good. As you say, the added sweetness of the cure plays against the taro leaf very nicely.

As for the chicken, I'm not sure what it's proper name is. It sounds like an odd combination, but the end result isn't far off from a balsamic vinaigrette used as a marinade. Anyway, this is how my aunt does it, with great success.

1 part shoyu

1 part sugar

1 part Italian dressing (premade or after being mixed, not the powder itself)

Marinate the chicken for 2 days. It tends to flare up, so blot the chicken somewhat dry before grilling over medium coals.