The Perfect Sunday Morning | Teen Ink

The Perfect Sunday Morning

October 10, 2021
By EstherLee BRONZE, Seoul, Other
EstherLee BRONZE, Seoul, Other
1 article 0 photos 0 comments

From the time when I was a little girl, Sundays have been one of the few days I could sleep in as much as I wanted. But you know how when you’re allowed to sleep in, you tend to sometimes wake up even earlier than expected? That was exactly the case for me. On the weekends, maybe because I wanted to play more, maybe because I just was given the chance to choose between waking up early or sleeping in, or maybe just because my body had adapted to the early waking pattern, I’d always wake up quite early. Or maybe it was my dad’s egg rice with its nutty, savory scent that would sneak its way up from the kitchen. 

My dad’s egg rice is the simplest yet the most nostalgic food I’ve ever eaten in my whole life. This simple dish in and of itself represents my childhood where I would wake up every Sunday morning to see my dad cooking this egg rice for me and my brother. The ingredients are very simple: it’s just white rice, one or two eggs, a tablespoon of soy sauce, and, finally, a healthy amount of sesame oil. From the first time I had my dad’s egg rice, I loved it; it was probably when I was in first grade that he made this dish for me. As he mixed up the rice and the eggs in the bowl, he would tell me how he made this dish also for my mom before me and my brother were born. My dad would fry the eggs sunny side up, scoop some steaming white rice from the rice cooker, then put all the ingredients in a bowl and mix it all together. When he mixed the rice, I could see the uncooked egg yolks oozing out of the perfectly fried egg whites, mixed well with a metal spoon that probably every Korean family would have. The cling clang sound of the spoon clashing with the ceramic bowl together with the scent of the sesame oil was what made my Sunday morning complete.

Now, it's not that my dad doesn’t cook me that rice anymore. He would be more than happy to prepare it if I asked for it; but nowadays, I usually don’t eat breakfast or just have a cup of coffee instead. But a couple of weeks ago, I craved the egg rice so much on a weekday night that I just decided to go for it myself. I felt that I wasn’t going to mess it up because it had so few ingredients—how hard could it be? Well, the result was pretty similar to what my dad made me, but it just had some twists. The first one was that I put some chili oil that I made a couple weeks ago into my egg rice. I had gotten this oil recipe from my grandma a few days before I made it; it was just minced up garlic, ginger, and Korean chili flakes all in a stainless-steel bowl and pouring some heated up oil into the bowl and mixing it well together to get all the ingredients infused. With the chili oil addition, the egg rice tasted more flavorful, and the kick from the chili really enhanced the flavor. But even so, something was missing, and I guess it's just the mood of that relaxing Sunday morning when I woke up and the meal was just there. After all, in class we talked about having the same food on vacation and having it at home, and that they are both very different experiences; I guess mood matters that much.

I’m sure that everybody has their own nostalgic food like my egg rice, and though it may be very simple, I learned once again that food, no matter what kind, can convey and evoke so many different feelings and experiences.


The author's comments:

I am an 11th grader at an international school in Seoul. 


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