/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>Be Korean
>Biological mother died at childbirth
>Dad and his mom/my grandma move to America to start new life
>Dad worked while my grandma took care of me
>Grandma was born in 1933. Old school, been through crazy shit
>Would literally spend the whole day cooking shit, happy as a fucking pea
>Be 10 and ask her why she's so happy just making food all day
>"When I was a child, I helped my mother cook for the family and my six siblings. I loved her food and our time together. There was no TV back then and I didn't know how to read, so cooking passed the time well."
>"Then when I turned 17, the war broke out. My two older brothers went to fight and died. My mother was old at that point and died of pneumonia while we escaped from Seoul."
>ohshit.jpg
>"The rest of my family made it to a refugee camp. We survived on US rations for years. Food is a blessing, anon."
>Changes my whole perspective on cooking and ask her to teach me like her mom
>"Oh boys shouldn't cook, anon. They should play and study and work. Cooking is a woman's duty."
>Beg her to at least teach me how to make my favorite dish, seolleongtang, an oxtail bone soup
>Shit takes like 6 hours to make, but she tells me everything to do and I burn it into my memory
>Be 12 and grandma passed away from pancreatic cancer
>Dad depressed, start eating take-out for dinner every night
>One Saturday, decide to spend the day making that oxtail soup for me and my dad
>Use allowance money and walked to grocery store for ingredients
>Shit literally takes 6 hours, but super-determined
>Dad comes home from work, crazy surprised and we eat dinner like normal again for once
>Dad starts tearing up
>"Tastes just like grandma's, anon"

After that he started getting his shit together slowly, he's remarried now and I'm an adult but I still make that soup for him on my grandma's birthday.