Independence Day… what do those words conjure up in your mind? A whoop ass Hollywood movie? Or a day to celebrate the signing of the Declaration that pronounced freedom, opportunity and equality for all? 

While Will Smith certainly has his charms, it’s all about the latter for me. America has been very good to our family, providing us with a new country to call our own, opportunities to do well in business, the chance to bring the family over and see to their success.  But how did this come about?

Over 40 years ago, my dad, a 30-something with little money, but with brains, ambition and a hunger to discover the new, landed in San Francisco. He brought my mother, then his fiancé, along and soon they were settled as new immigrants. He worked very hard as he realized one asset he didn’t have was mastery of the English language. So what was there to do? He decided his one chance at a positive future was to open a restaurant. But San Francisco was hardly the place to open yet another Chinese restaurant… So after scouting around the country, we arrived in Chicago where Dad worked for a friend as he was figuring out his next steps. He met a lovely couple who became our friends and ultimately, like family. Where else but in America would an older Jewish couple take a young Chinese family under their wings with the ease that the Cohens did?

Through my new surrogate grandparents, Auntie Frances, their daughter, came unto the scene. A harpist with the St Louis Symphony Orchestra, she encouraged Dad to open a restaurant in her town, assuring him that there was no competition whatsoever. And thus, my family’s restaurant dynasty began, thanks to a persistent (and Chinese food-craving) musician…

Well, dynasty might be pushing it, but we do have numerous restaurants in the family. Look, we worked for everything we have. In fact, the older generation worked damn hard, fingers-to-the-bone hard!  But had we been in another, less open, less welcoming country, things could have turned out quite differently. I haven’t lived in the States for a looooong while, which is one of the few things that irks my dad. “I move so far to the US to give you a better life and you move away?!” He’s more or less ok with it now–he has to be, I guess! I think he even understands the need for me to find my own feet. After all, he did the same. But despite my long absence from America, part of me will always be American. And proud to be so.

Times are a bit different now compared to when my parents first arrived in the States. Economically, politically, socially, America is a lot more complicated. But I’d like to think that the sense of freedom and openness still exist. That the new can still feel welcome and be embraced. That opportunities are still out there for the taking (hello Facebook!). That the population is made up of some of the friendliest people around. The enthusiasm and the “can-do” attitude that’s absolutely infectious. Yes, we can be cocky, but we’ve got spirit. The 4th of July–Independence Day–epitomises that spirit and the freedom we have as a country. The food, like the people, is hearty and generous, and an American barbecue is a great example of this casual, welcoming outlook on this special day.

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You know what they always say; daughters and their fathers have a special bond. Your dad is the first man you love, he’s your hero and will forever be the standard against which all future men must measure up against.

My boyfriends always had a tough act to follow. Unlike most traditional Chinese fathers, my dad could clean a house from top to bottom, sew hems, buttons, iron (beautifully!), build furniture, repair seemingly anything and cook. Damn, can that man cook! Naturally, when I was a little girl, to me, he was the best chef in the world. It was only as I grew older and travelled the world, eating in all sorts of places, from hole-in-the-wall joints to Michelin-starred establishments, did I realise that his palate was possibly a bit limited. He really preferred Asian cuisines, by which I mean Chinese, Korean and Japanese. He didn’t care much for Thai or Indian cuisines, citing their use of spices as being too much for him. He came to like French and Italian, but North Asian food is where his heart is.

But gosh, what he did with that palate! When we were little, he used to take us out to different restaurants on Mondays, the only day our restaurant was closed. We ate in all kinds of places and sometimes we’d get obsessed with one particular dish. Well—danged if he didn’t manage to recreate that at home! More often than not, he did recreate them really well. I remember a lemon chicken in particular that became a regular addition to his repertoire.

He was always trying to teach us more about taste and flavours. After I had a bite of something, he’d ask, “So what do you think is in it?” It was this way that I learned to discern between the subtle flavours of many ingredients. Even now, whenever I eat anything I like or am intrigued by, I am always dissecting flavour profiles in my head.

These days though, Dad tends to stick to the Chinese classics. Of these, one of my favourites has got to be jiaozi, those little fat pockets of juicy fragrant goodness. So much love and effort goes into these dumplings, from their handmade skins to the carefully seasoned and mixed filling.

Then, the assembly! This can be tedious but our family often made a little party of it, and this was even more fun if my aunts were around. One person rolled out the skins, another filled them. We would gossip and joke and laugh. The more the merrier and the more dumplings we made in the end. Whilst jiaozi are not the more refined xiaolongbao, they are, like my family, hearty, soul-warming and fairly forgiving (in that they don’t require 18 perfect folds and you can vary the filling to your taste).

The last time he came to visit, Dad filled my freezer with bags of these little gems. Now each time I pull some out, I think of him and for a little while, he’s right there with me.

Jiaozi are often eaten for the Lunar New Year because their shape harks back to ancient Chinese money—gold and silver ingots to be exact. Another reason is that the words Jiaozi literally means to sleep together and have sons, a much-desired outcome amongst the Chinese. We also eat these because they are delicious savoury mouthfuls and almost a complete meal in every bite.

So here I share my recipe for this specialty of the Shandong region, from where my dad hails. In his bid to constantly make my life easier, he suggested substituting courgette, which doesn’t require salting and squeezing dry, which the more commonly used cabbage does. Isn’t he the best?!

All photography featured in this post from Rodgers Photography

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