A dish that makes you run out of rice on a rainy day.

In late autumn, the central region of Vietnam is blanketed in white rain; the rain soaks the earth, the water flows too fast to drain, and then floods inundate the country roads and streets. Those days of incessant rain evoke memories of simple meals of vegetables and fish sauce from the days when I was still gathered with my parents and siblings.

Pickled vegetables - a dish that makes you eat less rice on rainy days.

To provide for all seven growing children, and to give them a good education, my parents had to work incredibly hard and be incredibly resourceful. Besides helping my father provide for the children, my mother also had to open a small grocery store at home to earn extra income.

Besides buying wholesale goods to resell, my mother often prepared ready-made meals according to the season to save people the trouble of cooking after working in the fields. On the 15th and 1st of the lunar month, she would make fermented tofu and soy sauce to sell for vegetarian meals; on ordinary days, with the cucumbers, papayas, and eggplants readily available in the garden, she would make pickled cucumbers. Everyone in my neighborhood was captivated by the pickled cucumbers made by my mother's diligent hands, especially during the rainy and windy days of September and October in the lunar calendar.

To make the pickled anchovy dish that people often call "a dish that makes you eat less rice when it's raining," my mother has to buy anchovies and pickle them in earthenware jars starting in March. She gently washes the fresh anchovies, drains them in a basket, and mixes one bowl of anchovies with two or three bowls of salt before putting them into jars and sealing them tightly.

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On sunny days, anyone who comes to my house will see a dozen earthenware jars, brown in color, spread out to dry in the sun. Taking advantage of the clear weather, my mother slices tomatoes, cucumbers, and papayas, dries them, washes them with salt water, and squeezes them dry with a cloth; then she puts them into glass jars, presses them tightly, and slowly pours in fermented fish sauce.

After a week, my mother would take the pickled cucumbers, papayas, and other vegetables out of the marinade, pound chili peppers, garlic, and sugar together, mix well, and then package them into individual bags to sell to people. The bowl of pickled vegetables looked appealing with the white of the cucumbers, papayas, and garlic; the light green of the melons; and the red of the chili peppers…

Scoop up a bowl of hot rice, add a few chopsticks of boiled vegetables and some pickled cucumbers and tomatoes, and the rice pot will be empty in no time. In the old days, despite hard work, meals were simple; just white rice with vegetables and pickles was considered a luxury.

The simple, everyday meals of fermented fish sauce that my family used to enjoy have faded into the past. Adults now crave it less because they fear high blood pressure, and children are happy with modern dishes… As for me, whenever I crave fermented fish sauce, I can find it at the market or supermarket, but the fragrant aroma and the crunchy, salty taste of the old days are nowhere to be found.

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Those flavors of the past, though so far away, still bring tears to my eyes whenever I remember them. I can hear the lullaby from the hammock of my hometown, feel the gentle breeze from the hand fanning me, and long for the warmth of a bowl of rice with the pickled vegetables my mother used to make...

Source: https://baodanang.vn/mon-het-com-ngay-mua-dam-3306714.html