THE UNSOCIAL FEAST

Yesterday's lunch was fried rice with chopped bacon, juicy sausage chunks, bitter melon, shrimp paste, and sambal added generously during cooking. Nigel Ng (aka Uncle Roger) might not have approved. Jamie Oliver wouldn't have know what to make of it. And my Parsee friend, had I served her that, would cuss, look aghast, and accuse me of offending everybody's ancestors including my own. Because she is very unfond of bitter melon. Traumatized during childhood, I expect.

Years ago I sent a question to a Dutchman about the very tasty meat-stuffed vegetables his wife cooked that he had described in detail on his food page. What, I wished to know, was 'sopropo' in English? He responded that he had no clue. He didn't know what many foods were called in English. I few days later, while eating bitter melon beef (苦瓜炒牛肉 'fu gwaa chaau ngau yiuk') for dinner I decided to consult my dictionary of Dutch as it is used in Suriname (Dutch Guiana). Um. Turns out that sopropo is bitter melon.

Not once in his description had he mentioned its most marked characteristic, one which would scare off most Anglos, many children, and some Parsees: it is bitter.

The top illustration shows it after cooking with salted black bean (豆豉 'dau si'), the lower picture is what it looks like whole and fresh.


The people I work with would probably find it utterly repulsive. My mother could have been ambivalent; on the one hand she'd have considered it virtually inedible, but on the other hand it is bitter and rather like the severe Protestant uncle of vegetables, so perhaps it is healthy. The parsee says it's nasty. The bookseller might be amused by the boldness and chutzpah.

I am fortunate that my apartment mate rather likes it. Imagine how horrid it would be if I lived with someone who had psychosomatic food allergies (self diagnosed "gluten intolerance", for instance) or the usual dietary neuroses so common among us white Americans.

Of course I'd very probably be dead by now.
Gustatory dullness would have done me in.

Sopropo is delicious.


I rarely eat with other people.
For ... reasons.



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