This article provides an introduction to Taiwanese cuisine through the lens of the film Eat Drink Man Woman. The opening scene depicts an elderly man cooking several classic Taiwanese dishes in his kitchen over the course of six minutes. His skilled preparation of dishes like fish fillets, pork belly, and chicken immersed the viewer in the flavors and techniques of Taiwanese cooking. The article notes that Taiwanese cuisine has been influenced by Chinese, Dutch, and Japanese cultures and offers a rich variety of tastes.
This article provides an introduction to Taiwanese cuisine through the lens of the film Eat Drink Man Woman. The opening scene depicts an elderly man cooking several classic Taiwanese dishes in his kitchen over the course of six minutes. His skilled preparation of dishes like fish fillets, pork belly, and chicken immersed the viewer in the flavors and techniques of Taiwanese cooking. The article notes that Taiwanese cuisine has been influenced by Chinese, Dutch, and Japanese cultures and offers a rich variety of tastes.
This article provides an introduction to Taiwanese cuisine through the lens of the film Eat Drink Man Woman. The opening scene depicts an elderly man cooking several classic Taiwanese dishes in his kitchen over the course of six minutes. His skilled preparation of dishes like fish fillets, pork belly, and chicken immersed the viewer in the flavors and techniques of Taiwanese cooking. The article notes that Taiwanese cuisine has been influenced by Chinese, Dutch, and Japanese cultures and offers a rich variety of tastes.
This article provides an introduction to Taiwanese cuisine through the lens of the film Eat Drink Man Woman. The opening scene depicts an elderly man cooking several classic Taiwanese dishes in his kitchen over the course of six minutes. His skilled preparation of dishes like fish fillets, pork belly, and chicken immersed the viewer in the flavors and techniques of Taiwanese cooking. The article notes that Taiwanese cuisine has been influenced by Chinese, Dutch, and Japanese cultures and offers a rich variety of tastes.
The island's cuisine offers a rich palette of flavors, textures and dishes with roots in the Netherlands, Japan and, of course, China. It makes for a delightful experience.
Published on April 25, 2023, at 5:47 am (Paris), updated on April 25, 2023, at 8:04 am | 5 min.
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U ntil now, I didn't know anything about Taiwanese cuisine. Nada, walou. I just knew where to stick a pin on a map for the country: a large island in East Asia, roughly four times the size of Corsica, located off the coast of China, north of the Philippines and south of Japan. And then, one sleepless night, it unexpectedly offered itself up to me in a way that was as delicious as it was direct. It was one o'clock in the morning, my eyelids were heavy, my stomach was empty and I'd just started replaying Eat Drink Man Woman on the Arte website. This third film by famous Taiwanese director Ang Lee was released in 1994 and nominated the following year for the Oscar for best foreign language film. The opening scene completely drew me in and I'm still salivating over it to this day. It's daytime and the camera has entered the kitchen of an elderly man wearing an apron, his sleeves rolled up. For six long minutes, we watch as he prepares a meal, the lens zooming in on his skilled hands, examining his every move. In the middle of a tiled wall, the movements of various utensils (ladles, a colander, bamboo baskets, an enormous array of sharp knives) above a wok gradually allow us to hear the sizzling sound of ingredients cooking. For a moment, the smell of cooking seems to pass right through the screen and into my nose. The color of the food changes before my very eyes and I can almost imagine what its texture feels like. In fact, I am witnessing the creation of several typical Taiwanese dishes as if I were right there in the same room instead of on the other side of the screen. And at this late hour of the night nothing can make me want to start cooking more.
To achieve this masterful sequence, which required more than a week of shooting, Lee used three professional chefs. The main actor, Sihung Lung, had to be trained how to use the utensils. The film begins like this: A pair of hands immersed in a fish tank catches a fish. Using a pair of chopsticks, the chef immobilizes the animal and then guts it on a block. After lifting out the fillets, he crisscrosses the flesh with a knife. Once floured, the fish is transformed by being dunked into a bath of boiling oil, before being returned to room temperature. The man then removes two beautiful pieces of pork belly from a dark marinade, fries them and puts them in a bowl filled with ice cubes. He delicately slices several thin, juicy-looking strips of meat and puts them in the bottom of a bowl with spring onions, sugar and star anise. A few seconds later, the concoction disappears underneath the lid of a large, steaming basket. The cook then goes to his yard in search of a chicken. After an interval, the chicken has been plucked and is ready to simmer inside a terracotta pot, in a broth that we can assume is thick and intensely flavorful. You have 60% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.
