Any one of this young woman's videos are enough to make one believe that food can be more than Drudgery. Watch several, and become convinced that American's are doing food all wrong.
I had given up gardening when my parents passed, because of The Hoard. It was so overwhelming that I couldn't function. But The Hoard has been gone for two years.
I started watching Liziqi about a year ago. I know nothing beyond what I've seen, but that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter that only a few videos have English sub-titles either. The important part is the inspiration.
Her garden is her back yard, or all her yard is a garden, I'm not sure which. But there are trellises of good things to eat right outside her door. Squashes, tomatoes, roses (she eats roses!), chickens and ducks, pigs and a cow are all right there, within reach. Noodle beans hang down, just begging to be eaten, or fermented, or dried, or a bit of both. I've watched her grind corn and soy beans into pulp and steamed into cakes filled with rose petals.
Most videos show simple food - the meat is chopped right in front of the camera, vegetables are diced or sliced and it all goes into a big Wok. But some dishes are elaborate. Grinding pulp looks like backbreaking work. Still there's something about this process that makes sense.
This food looks -- accessible? Is that a good word? That's what I find inspiring. Walking out of the house into a garden where one can pick dinner off the vine.
The point is this: I can grow the same vegetables that I like best in stir-fry and rice noodle dishes. This year the garden wasn't much. The carrots were tiny, the beets likewise, the Bok Choy was tough as nails. But the yellow and purple beans were great, cantaloupe grew up the trellis, as did the tomatoes.
It was so satisfying to pick it and cook it up, just like girl in the video. I can make my garden an interesting place and enjoy eating food that's a little tiny bit pretty.
This is about progress, not perfection.
So I'm very pleased with going from nasty, over-salted, soggy and disgusting pizza to home-grown and home-cooked food.
The funny thing was the grass that grew up in the garden space was greener than the rest. Even more interesting was the horses and alpacas came in to graze that grass down until it looked liked I'd mowed it. They ate the garlic (what?) and the carrots (I get that), but didn't touch anything else. So I guess that next year I'll put netting over the garlic and carrots and let the grazers enjoy the grass.
