The Last Chinese Chef (19 page)

“I will,” he said, surprising her. “But I think in a different form.”

“Good,” she said, “because I love it.” She turned to the second platter, which held lotus root and crisp, strong-tasting yellow celery and sausage. Also delicious. Then the beggar’s chicken. It looked at first like a foil-wrapped whole bird, but he undid it, folded back layers of crinkly baking bags, and broke the seal on a tight molded wrap of lotus leaves. A magnificently herbed chicken aroma rushed into the air.

Maggie couldn’t wait. She picked up a mouthful of chicken that fell away from the carcass and into her chopsticks at a touch. It was moist and dense with profound flavor, the good nourishment of chicken, first marinated, then spiked with the bits of aromatic vegetable and salt-cured ham which had been stuffed in the cavity and were now all over the bird. Shot through everything was the pungent musk of the lotus leaf.

At once she knew she should write about this place. She should give the recipe for this dish, catch the glorious bustle of this restaurant, describe these tall windows looking over the majesty of the lake and the virgin green hills beyond. Her one column was inadequate — inadequate even to tell the story of Sam Liang, which was so much richer than anything she could contain in a brief piece. And in addition to him she had so many moments, like this one, this lunch at Lou Wai Lou.

After they ate they walked outside and stood on the steps to look out at the lake. “The thing I can’t believe is that behind me” — she waved back over her left shoulder — “is that gray, honking city. While over there” — she pointed across the water — “I see nothing but trees and hills. No development. In this day and age that’s amazing! What’s over there?”

“Monasteries and stuff,” he said. “Temples.” Then she looked around and saw that his attention was focused away from her and the lake, trained on the bottom of the steps, where an older man used a bucket of water and a brush as long as a mop, which he dipped in the water and swirled on the wide smooth pavement.

“What’s he writing?” she whispered.

“A poem. Unless it’s a short one, the beginning will be gone by the time he gets to the end. It will evaporate away. That’s the idea. It’s like a recitation.”

“But who is he?”

“Just a guy out enjoying the day.”

“Can you read the poem?”

“Me? No! Impossible.” He looked at Maggie. If she stayed here, in time she would understand more. Only half the beauty of what the man was doing was the poem, beyond doubt some beloved classic. The other half was his calligraphy, which rendered each character into something like an abstract painting, beautiful, but all the more indecipherable to Sam. “Elder Born,” he said in polite Mandarin, “may I trouble you as to the author of this poem?”

“Su Dongpo!” the man cried up the steps, delighted.

“It’s the guy the pork dish was named after,” Sam said to her.

He knew how strange the connection between food and poetry seemed at first; he remembered his Uncle Xie explaining it to him. “The number-one relationship is between the chef and the gourmet, my son. The chef must give the
meishijia
what he wants. Here in Hangzhou, for a thousand years, the
meishijia
have been the literati, so we give them dishes named for poets. We create carvings and presentations to evoke famous poetry and calligraphy parties throughout history. We strive for dishes of artifice which inspire poetic musings. The highest reward for any Hangzhou chef is to hear poetry being created and applauded by his diners out in the dining room — oh! Nothing else in my life has given me such a good feeling, except my wife and my son and my daughters — and you, my son, of course. This is what you must understand if you are to be a true Chinese chef. Eating is only the beginning of cuisine! Only the start! Listen. Flavor and texture and aroma and all the pleasure — this is no more than the portal. Really great cooking goes beyond this to engage the mind and the spirit — to reflect on art, on nature, on philosophy. To sustain the mind and elevate the spirit of the
meishijia.
Never cook food just to be eaten, Nephew!”

Sam had tried, but here he truly was held back by being a foreigner. He had been born, raised, and educated in America. He lacked the dizzying welter of references and touchpoints that would have been his if he had grown up here. He had only his uncles. They had done their best to fill him in on five thousand years of culture, starting the moment he arrived. For this he not only accepted their abuse, he was grateful for it.

In another taxi they sailed back up the road toward the lake and the hotels. It was time now. He needed to get on to his uncle’s.

He had called. He was told Xie had been carried down to the kitchen and was waiting for him. His wife, Wang Ling, was there beside him, and since yesterday all four children had been home — three daughters and a son. Only one of the daughters, Songling, still lived in Hangzhou; she managed another venerable restaurant called Shan Wai Shan. She was the only one of the Xie children who had followed her father into the world of cuisine. The other two daughters, Songan and Songzhe, and the son, Songzhao, all had professional careers and families in Shanghai. They were Sam’s generation, and he thought of them as one thinks of far-off cousins, rarely seen but always spoken of with fondness. When they were born, their father had insisted upon using the traditional generation name, so that their given names all shared the same first syllable. By then, in the 1950s, this was hardly ever done — but that was Third Uncle, a stubborn reprobate, still using the generation name even after his own father had died in prison for being an imperial cook.

The old man had used the same iron will on Sam. No one was harder on Sam than Xie. None had used harsher names. Xie had called him a worthless lump of mud and a motherless turtle. He told him he didn’t deserve to be a Liang. More times than Sam could bear to remember he had taken away what Sam was in the middle of cooking and dumped it out.
“Zai kaishi yixia,”
Uncle would order, slamming the clean wok back down in front of him, Start again. And Sam would swallow back the humiliation and know that Uncle would not be teaching him if he didn’t believe he could learn it, could do it. Each time Sam would resolve to keep trying.

And now Uncle was slipping away from the earth, and all Sam wanted was to get to him, quickly, and be with him once again, while he lived.

She turned to him in the back seat. “If you can just tell me a good place to eat tonight. Near my hotel.”

“By yourself ?”

“Of course by myself.”

“You can’t eat alone,” he said, and even as he spoke he asked himself what he was doing. Why not just say goodbye? It was time for him to go to Uncle’s. “I told you, that’s one of the important things about Chinese food. Maybe
the
most important thing. It’s about community.”

“I’m okay eating by myself. I always eat alone on the road, and always
always
since Matt died.”

“That’s bad luck. I might have to try and change you.”

“You can’t change me,” she informed him.

“But to eat alone is anti-Chinese.”

“I’m not Chinese. Look, Sam, you’re being so nice and you really don’t have to be. It’s just, I’m here. I don’t want to waste a meal. Tonight I want to go someplace good. Just tell me. That’s all.”

“I could easily give you a place. But the thing you should really do is come with me. Eat with the Xie family. Then I will bring you back here.”

“I don’t want to get in between you and your family.”

“You won’t. You’ll be watching a lot. I’ll be the only person you can talk to, and I might be occupied. You okay with that?”

“Yes,” she said. “I’m a writer. I love to observe. But this is your family. It’s a sensitive time.”

“But I would like you to come.”

“Okay,” she said after a minute.

He felt himself smile. He was relaxed with her, which he hadn’t felt in so long. She was a friend. Nothing wrong with it.

They had reached her hotel parking lot. She slid out the door and pulled her bag behind her. “Will you wait for me a moment? Just let me put this stuff in the room. I’ll be right back.”

“Okay,” he said.

Maggie closed the door and trotted away from him to the entrance. She was aware that he was watching her from behind. When she was younger she would have worried about whether her shape was pleasing or not, but not now. She was old, forty, and besides, he was not interested. Still, she was glad she was going along. She felt a pull to him. Maybe they’d be friends after all.

She ran upstairs and put her things in the room and then came back down. Another thing: it would be a blessing to have company tonight, not to be alone. She had done it, got the sample, sent it off, and there was always that sense of letdown when a difficult task was finished. There was also the sadness, the finality; if Shuying wasn’t Matt’s, then she, Maggie, would never see his face in any living form, ever again. In time she might even forget his face. She would remember it only the way it had been captured in pictures. She was going to see herself get old in the mirror, and never remember him any other way but young.

“You okay?” said Sam when she got in the car.

“I am,” she said, and she closed the door behind her.

 

Xie must have fallen asleep because he awoke to the sound of the car door. Then a second door. Voices. A woman. His shaggy brows lifted. Finally, after all this time, the boy had brought a woman here! An instant web of thoughts bloomed and branched out in his mind as he heard their steps coming up to the door.

“Men kai-de!”
he called. Door’s open!

The door pushed open and in came Nephew, smiling, wet-eyed, and behind him an outside woman with large, dark eyes and unruly hair.

Nephew dropped beside him and held him in the Western way as he murmured to him in Chinese. Then he said, “Uncle, this is Maggie McElroy,” and raised a hand to the girl. Xie did his best to give her a smile. She was pleasing in spite of her face, which was too sharp. Of course she could have looked like a dog and he would have been happy, considering that she was a woman and Nephew was bringing her.
“Huanying, huanying,”
Xie said.

“He says welcome.”

“My pleasure to meet you,” said Maggie.

“Ta hen gaoxing renshi ni,”
said Sam.

Xie had been watching her eyes. He could always tell when someone understood. “She can’t talk?” he said abruptly in Chinese.

“No, Uncle, not a word.”

“Too bad.”

“No! No, Uncle, it’s not like that. She’s not my girlfriend. She’s a writer, she’s doing an article about the competition. It’s no more than that.”

“Did
I
say something?” Xie demanded. “Did this worthless old lump say anything to her but welcome?”

“No. Sorry. Anyway, I’ll run her back to her hotel after dinner.”

“She is your good friend, she is welcome.”

“She’s not — oh, never mind.” Besides, she was his friend, in a way.

Uncle Xie was looking sternly at him. “Enough.” The old voice was imperious. “Show me your wrists!”

Sam unbuttoned his cuffs and rolled them back. He knew he wasn’t going to have enough new scars to please Uncle. Serious Chinese cooks always had a signature pattern of mottle-burns. These burns could extend past the wrists all the way up the forearms. Just reaching across the stove, a chef could be burned by spattering oil, and the burns left their own special marks. Even American immigration officers checking incoming Chinese chefs with work visas knew to check the wrists and forearms for the spatter-pattern of scars.

Xie craned his neck. “Closer!” he rasped, and then when he got a look he let out a weak snort. “What do you do all day, lie about? Do you ignore your prayers to your calling? When are you going to rush to clasp the Buddha’s foot — the day of the banquet? Don’t you know by then it will be too late?”

“Uncle, I have been thinking, and trying dishes — ”

“Flush your thinking! It is the American in you that thinks somehow everything you need will arise by magic inside you! Wrong! You have to learn! To learn you have to work!”

“But Uncle — ”

“If you were working you would be burned!”

Behind them Maggie stared. Though she didn’t understand their Chinese, it was obvious that, as sick and weak as the old man was, he was hitting hard. Yet Sam didn’t seem to mind. He could feel her watching and turned around. “Don’t worry. It’s his way of saying I matter to him.”

“It’s fine,” she said.

Then Uncle Xie cut back in with his rasping Mandarin. “I’m waiting! And since you did not bring this foreign female here to tell me you had a special feeling for her, why are you talking to her? Lump! Dogmeat! Do you think I have so much time left? Wash your hands! Tie back your hair! You should cut it. It looks terrible. Prepare!”

“We’re going to be cooking now,” Sam told Maggie. “You’ll have to forgive me.”

“Nothing to forgive. I’ll watch. That’s why I’m here.” She crept to the side and sat down. “You’re fun to watch.”

“See, that’s why I wanted you here. You’re nice to me. I get nothing but tough love from my relatives. Ah, here’s Wang Ling, Uncle Xie’s wife.” And he bent to hug a small, white-haired bird of a woman.

He spoke in Chinese to the old lady, introducing Maggie, after which she took Maggie’s elbow with a surprisingly strong little hand. She sat beside Xie and soothed him while Maggie settled on her small worn stool against the wall.

First there was soaking of lotus leaves, which Maggie gradually saw were meant to wrap short ribs. She watched as Sam followed instructions from Uncle Xie and mixed a marinade of soy sauce, scallions, ginger, sugar, peanut oil, and sesame oil, plus a spoonful of something. “Bean paste,” he shot back at her over his shoulder. Her notebook crept out of her purse practically of its own accord, and she started writing things down.