Kyung-ran Jo - Tongue

One minute. Or maybe twenty or thirty seconds. A short time, but it feels longer than any time we spent together and it’s as if we’re saying a long farewell. We say a farewell that isn’t dotted with tears or laughter, that holds no wistful feelings. He turns around and goes into the kitchen and I push through the front doors and leave.

I wake up from my sleep. I hear through the smell of grass a thin and faint song, like weeping.

TONGUE WITH TRUFFLES

Serves one

Ingredients:

150 grams fresh red tongue

Leek

Onion

Carrots

Celery

Radish

Thyme

White wine

Water

Pinch of salt

Two spears asparagus

Truffles

For the sauce:

100 grams watercress

Garlic

Truffle oil

Lemon juice to taste

Whole green peppercorns

Directions:

1. In a large pot, boil leeks, onion, carrots, celery, radish, thyme, white wine, water, salt, and tongue for 30 minutes. The tongue will shrink when it is dropped in the boiling water.

2. Remove the tongue from the stock. When the tongue cools, cut off the membranes.

3. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

4. Place the tongue in the oven and bake for 15 minutes.

5. Cut the tongue into half-inch slices.

6. Snap off the ends of the asparagus and steam or sauté in olive oil in a hot pan.

7. In a bowl, mix together the ingredients for the sauce. Finely grind whole green peppercorns.

8. Pour the sauce on a plate and arrange the slices of tongue on top. Garnish with sliced truffles. Place the asparagus on the side.

Suggestions:

• Instead of baking the tongue in the oven, try pan-frying it in olive oil.

• If the scent of the sauce is too intense, you can replace the watercress with finely minced Italian parsley and garlic in a 3:2 ratio.

• If the tongue is not the freshest, you can add nutmeg to enhance its flavor.

I NO LONGER BELIEVE that the truffle symbolizes love. Love shatters with the rumbling of thunder, but thunder causes truffles to grow. Sure, both are hard to find. You harvest truffles, which can’t be seen by the human eye, by following a trained sow with an excellent sense of smell. So it’s closer to hunting. Truffles are black and round like a forgotten, burnt potato. Among food lovers, the truffle is considered precious, along with caviar and foie gras, exciting them with a whiff and giving them joy. The black diamond of the earth shatters more easily than glass, and it’s hard to handle. Too much of it works as an aphrodisiac, like nutmeg or cloves. Even expert harvesters exercise extreme caution when harvesting, sliding a finger carefully into the ground. The truffle is difficult to work with unless you’re an experienced, skilled cook; it is the subject of worship. Even though you can’t see them and you can’t tell for sure, you pile branches over the spots where you think they may grow to maintain the right humidity. You harvest them in October and November and they are reborn in the next autumn rain. Every time I have a chance to eat truffles I wonder whether they are so treasured not because of their unique taste and scent of aged mud, but because you can’t find them easily and they’re impossible to farm. Truffles are always a part of the priciest dishes. I take out the truffle I obtained through Chef in May, which I sealed in a bottle in olive oil. Perfection is the key to sublime taste.

The touched expression on his face is probably because of the truffle. His eyes sparkle and his skin—the scalpel’s first point of contact if he were to be dissected—is taut and excited, anticipating the feast. And he asks again, as if to be reassured, “So this dinner is really the last time, right?”

I tell him that I won’t be contacting him again. After seven persistent calls he finally agreed and came to the house today. I put down the truffle and turn toward him. He used to be the person to whom I wanted to give my best. He used to be the person who made me feel as if I were looking at a better version of myself. The last thing I can give him is tonight’s feast.

I turn up the corners of my mouth and smile. “Of course. I won’t even call anymore. I keep my promises.”

“Okay… thanks.”

“You’re thanking me already before you’ve eaten? But what’s happened with Se-yeon?”

“Hmm?”

“I heard from Mun-ju. Se-yeon disappeared without a word?”

“Oh, no, it’s not like that.”

“What happened?”

“She said she wanted to rest a bit. Because when the cooking class opens she won’t have that kind of time.”

“Oh… so you heard from her?”

“Yeah, a few days ago.”

“Where is she?”

“Why are you so curious? You don’t even like her.”

“No, that’s not true.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Because of her I realized how much I treasure you.”

“That’s a little awkward to hear.”

“So when’s she coming back?”

“Soon.”

“Soon?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sure she’ll come back soon. Like nothing’s happened.”

He changes the subject. “But you look happy.”

“Oh, maybe because of my dream.”

“Dream?”

“Yeah, I had a dream about a beakfish.”

“Beakfish?”

“The Mediterranean fish with a golden crescent on its forehead. It’s really rare to catch that fish.”

“So you dreamed of a rare fish. I guess something good is going to happen to you.”

I’m standing in the kitchen wearing chef’s whites and my heels with pearls in the soles. Once, my favorite pastime was to stand in this open kitchen and make dinner, the person I love sitting in front of me. Why does everything feel so far away, as if it will never happen again? And why isn’t it happening again? I look at him over the chopping block. Seok-ju, I’m glad that after this dinner my heart can leave you, go far away, gradually . I dip my hot fingertips in ice water. “I’m going to Italy tomorrow.”

“Oh, really?” He can’t hide his relief. Both of you are the same—you are not careful . I open the fridge and take out the tongue that I aged after cleaning off the tendons and tattered muscles. I have to concentrate my cold fingertips on this deep red tongue. I wrap my palm around the knife. It feels good. The knife under my full control. This feeling is why I handle meat. I pour him another glass of champagne as an aperitif. And I whisper sweetly, “Don’t get drunk yet. I’m going to make you such a good meal that it’s going to melt your tongue.”

He lets his guard down because of his expectations for the meal, or maybe because I won’t be here tomorrow. If one person has changed and the other hasn’t, their former love becomes pathetic and stagnant and cruel. It’s better not to talk about the old times. But today may really be the last time that we sit across from each other in our kitchen and eat. Instead of feeling miserable, I feel sentimental.

“Do you remember that time?” I ask.

“What time?”

“When you regained consciousness.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“It was six months later.”

“…Yeah.”

“I still remember what you said when you opened your eyes.”

He’s quiet.

“You grabbed my hand and squeezed it.”

“Is dinner almost ready?”

“You told me we shouldn’t be apart anymore, remember? That you were afraid of not seeing me again. That even though you were unconscious, it was so real and painful. So you just kept thinking, this is a dream, a dream, I’m just dreaming.”

“…You said you wouldn’t do this. You told me it was only dinner.”

“When you were unconscious it wasn’t that hard. Even though the guy who caused the accident died, I knew you would wake up. You had to wake up, for me.”