MY MOM COOKS

By KIT A. NADADO

My mother would boil a pot of coconut milk gently simmering with bite-size chicken, diced
carrots, sayote and potatoes.

She called it Chicken Maryland. It is creamy ulam my siblings and I fight on the dining table over
many a Sunday after church, over discussion of who came late and how our dog Midnight dug
another hole somewhere in the garden.

My mom would put a steamy bowl on the table. Six greedy hands would snatch the ladle.

I scoop a cup of steaming rice, push the carrots, sayote, and potatoes to the side of the plate,
and eat the chicken bits.

“Eat your veggies, Kit.” My mom would quip. I would make a face, then eat some potatoes. She
would eat the carrots herself. She eats last.

On rainy Sundays, when our church shoes are out the kitchen half-wet in mud and rainwater, she
would cook Sinigang. The house would smell sweet and tangy as she adds crushed sampaloc
and sili to her concoction.

Beads of sweat would dot her forehead from the steam. Strands of hair would twirl on her face
like tentacles as she wipes her forehead with her shirt. We’d dig in dipping the tender meat cuts
into a saucer of patis. She’d eat last.

One time, I asked her casually between mouthfuls of her Nilagang Baboy, just why she’d eat last.
She shrugged, scoop some potatoes from the bowl and put them on my plate. I stabbed one
with a fork and took a bite.

“Mmmm, so good,” I told her. “ I love your cooking, mom.”

She stared at me, a smile forming on her lips.

“This is why I eat last,” she answered.

CREATIVE NONFICTION: ANALYZING THEMES AND TECHNIQUES USED IN A TEXT