Sunday, February 27, 2005

A Lost Art

We in North America, thanks to the persistence of our mothers, have lost the art of noodle slurping. This really is a delicate and tricky procedure. You can't purse your lips around the noodle, or you will end up wearing the soup or gravy sauce that your noodles are in as it runs off your lip, down your chin and well, you know the rest. I'm not talking about spaghetti either. I'm talking about big honken juicy suckers. Every soup that I've had so far at a restaurant has had these wonderful plump suckers in them.

Now, if you bring the noodle up to quickly, you get the loose, crazed fire hose effect. Both ending with the same results. Their contents are spewed chaoticly all over the place. I've even managed to hit my eye brow with residue. Not fun! It gets all over the table and even worse, your SHIRT! This is why I felt it necessary to post this blog. We need to learn the proper method of "The Slurp" I should warn you though, for the first several attempts, you will have this strange sensation of your mothers hand coming for the back of your head. This is post traumatic childhood syndrome and will pass with time. It does give you the jidders for a bit though.

The trick to the slurp is in creating an airflow strong enough to bring the noodle into your mouth without your lips really making contact with the noodle. Done properly, it's quite noisy. What you need to do is get your lips almost closed around the noodle and slurp. :-) If you get too much of your lip on the noodle, it comes in like a bullet and the aforementioned occurs. Use lots of napkins.

Unfortunately, I have not yet mastered this ancient technique. I find the noodle to be so long, thick and heavy, that I just can't quite do it. I think my problem lies in the fact that I'm a quiet slurper. I just can't get over the noise that it makes and I see phantom images of my Mom standing over me. I shudder just thinking about it.

I really recommend you give this a try. But like I said, it can't be spaghetti. It's got to be a big thick long heavy noodle. If you know someone who is Korean, you should invite them over for a demonstration. I think you'll really get a kick out of it, especially if your mom happens to be standing there.

8-P

2 Comments:

At 2:15 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

The answer to this well asked question is, it entirely depends on wheather my mother is near or not. :-)

I believe I'll be coming back. At least for a visit. I only know what I'm suposed to do for this year. God hasn't told me yet about the next year. I'm sure He will though. He told me about this one. :-)

 
At 10:49 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Japanese also have been slurping for generations, and trust me, it tastes much better in that way. But remember...everything takes practice. :) eiko

 

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