Canto Cutie - Volume 3

You’ve chosen to portray many classic
dishes like bitter melon, century egg tofu
salad, and okra salad. Why did you choose
these dishes? What do they represent?
你 描 繪 了 很 多 傳 統 菜 式 , 例 如 苦 瓜 、 涼 拌 皮
蛋 豆 腐 和 涼 拌 秋 葵 。 你 為 甚 麼 會 選 擇 這 些 菜
式 ? 它 們 代 表 甚 麼 ?
The dishes collection is a project I did with
‘Once Upon A Dish’, a platform curated by
Meiji, a friend of mine to celebrate dishes with
personal stories. I drew this collection during
the summer of 2020 whilst living in London
where I was reminiscing about being at home
in Hong Kong having dinner with my family.
Even though there is such a fast paced culture
in Hong Kong, my family always insisted that
we sit together in our dining room to have
dinner every night. We usually had chinese
dishes and we called them “ 餸 “ (side dishes),
and we paired them with rice. The perfect
proportion with ‘ 餸 ’ is ‘ 三 餸 一 湯 ’, which
means three side dishes and one big bowl of
soup. The side dishes are mostly vegetables
and meat, some stir fried and some slow
cooked, depending on time. My mom is also a
big believer of the ‘Yin (Cold) and Yang
(Warm)’ elements in food and the side dishes
have to complement each other to make sure
we get the right nutrients from the food.
As mentioned above, I now live in London
and I haven’t been back home for two years.
Even though I tried really hard to cook
Chinese dishes every night like my mom did
when I was in Hong Kong, it takes too much
time and it’s very hard to find the right
ingredients. The dishes I drew are a revamped
version of the “summer dishes” that my mom
used to make in the summer and it aims to
cool down your body so your body will feel
more “balanced”. The dishes are made with
the ingredients that I found in the UK and
they all have their own unique personal
sentiment.