The Teochew and Cantonese ‘fresh foods’ obsession is so ingrained in me. All of my languages for foods have to do with how knowing how to select fresh fish is a virtue, getting frozen is bad and morally suspect and foolish. Every elder in my life, alive and dead, felt similarly. I never even ate microwaved food until I came to America. I never had hot sauces bought off a shelf until I left Asia. (All of our condiments were freshly made)

Except for a handful of preserved staples (preserved soy beans, olive vegetables, all of the staples for porridge).

Sometimes I run up against the realities of where I live now and how my elders ate and how different that is. It’s not possible for me to eat like that all the time. Frozen fish is probably fine, but I still can’t accept it.

Coming from a culture that taught me that being extremely fussy and bothersome with food is a virtue, it’s fine to care deeply about each meal every single day, that’s what adults do, to.. whatever the hell this is here, I feel very out of place sometimes. I want to eat a certain way but I know I should probably also adapt to some realities. I want to live in a place where I can have fresh food at every meal.

It feels like a type of culture shock that I don’t know how to explain. And I miss being among people who feel similarly. Not just about the final product, like whether the dish is good or not, but about the whole thing, provenance and all. ‘I bought this fish from this person. They caught it here today. I am going to steam it, with salted plums, for dinner later, but for lunch we will have the taro rice and braised duck.’