We’re leaving tomorrow and we’ve got to empty the fridge tonight. Decisions to be made as to what stays, gets thrown out and what gets eaten. You’re either a thrower or a keeper.  I’m a keeper. I’ve never gone hungry, thank God, but I don’t know why I hate throwing food away. I can hear my mom saying, “Waste not, want not.” And I will eat that last grain of rice if it kills me! Or freeze it, if I really am too full to finish it. I have been known to steam that tupperware of frozen rice 6 months later. No one else in the family will eat it! Rice is sacred.

I remember my mom scraping the bottom of the rice cooker, where the rice is brown and hard. This was in the pre-teflon days. And she would put it in a pot, add some water and heat it up and once it was hot, she’d spoon it into her bowl. She’d dig heartily into it, chopsticks clicking away! "Come have some!" and I invariably did. I relished those crunchy rice grains, that burnt taste. We’d sit beside each other at the wooden kitchen table, silence reigning, except for the sound of her chopsticks and my spoon and fork. I wasn’t that good at chopsticks then, except at the school fair when you had to pick up 10 peanuts in 30 seconds or something.

Now, did I relish the burnt rice grains because they really were delicious or was it because I was sharing something special with my mom? Or maybe it’s both. Food is such a sensual experience. It’s a total experience. The eyes, nose, taste buds, tongue, palate, they’re all in! There’s color, texture, taste. And memory, too. The first time you tried a dish. You loved it? Hated it?

My husband will never eat durian again. It’s a brown spiky fruit that stinks. The airlines actually forbid carrying it on board. That’s how lethal it is. But for those of us who grew up eating it, it’s absolutely delicious. People actually say it smells like hell but tastes like heaven. But for us it smells and tastes like heaven. I remember coming home for lunch when I was 14 or 15 and we had durian for dessert. I made sure I didn’t use soap when I washed my hands so that when I went back to school, I could put my fingers under my classmates’ noses and they would all inhale deeply and say, “Ahhhh, durian!”

Well, when my French-Swiss husband came to ask for my hand in marriage, he slept in the guest room, just above the kitchen where my mom had just put 10 or 12 ripe durians ready for dessert. She naturally wanted him to taste the local delicacy. So, the next day after lunch, ta da! My mom proudly brought in the durian and put a piece in her future son-in-law’s plate. My husband, most valiant of men, ate it and even convinced my mom he liked it, so much so that she was going to give him another serving. Until I kicked her under the table.

He hasn’t had it since but he can sit at the table with us, while we devour our durian, without blanching. Such is love.