A box of tomato sauce was given to Xinjiang during the epidemic. Ketchup is made of tomatoes and sealed in a cylindrical iron bucket. The iron drum is seven centimeters in diameter and six centimeters in height. Put a ring on it and forcibly open the closed iron cover. The red sauce is delicate and shiny, which is very beautiful. At this time, the rich aroma of tomatoes brought me back to the memory of twenty years ago.
Twenty years ago, the tomatoes in my memory were all ripe, and the red pulp was covered with a layer of shiny particles, much like winter frost, which reminded me of the sentence in the Book of Songs, "Frost is not sown by moonlight, but the dew condensed by warm sun on the pulp." Take a bite, and the sweet and sour juice will flow from your fingers.
Every summer when tomatoes are ripe, my mother will make some ketchup to eat in winter. To make ketchup, first clean the infusion bottle found in the hospital, then cut the thoroughly cooked and cleaned tomatoes into thin strips with a knife, then put the cut tomatoes in the bottle, steam them in the pot for 20 minutes, and then cover them tightly with a rubber stopper after taking them out. Because the infusion bottle is used, the rubber cover has a pinhole pierced by the infusion device, and finally, adhesive tape is attached to the pinhole to make a bottle of ketchup. When there are no vegetables in winter, it is used to make egg gravy when eating noodles. Now that I think about it, red ketchup is sour, sweet and delicious.
In the past, tomatoes were made into sauces for storage, but now we can eat fresh tomatoes in winter. No matter what season, all kinds of vegetables are dazzling. Tomatoes are sold everywhere in supermarkets and stalls, and people often sell them in the street with trolleys and carts. Each tomato is bright in color and equal in size. It looks like a product on a factory assembly line, uniform. None of them are bad, none of them are green, they feel hard and have no temperature at all. Looks like a beauty recognized by plastic surgery hospital. I don't know if it's because I'm old and have no taste, or because the tomato is not the tomato I was when I was a child. It tastes like chewing wax and has lost its original flavor. Where is the smell of tomatoes? I looked all over the town, but I couldn't find the original flavor.
The development of science and technology gave birth to vegetable greenhouses, and farmers kept sending all kinds of vegetables to the table of city people. Persimmon seedlings in greenhouses are as uniform as terracotta warriors. Farmers nourish green leaves with pesticides, expand the economy, breed round and full tomatoes and outline a visual feast. If you are in full bloom, butterflies come, persimmons bloom, but no butterflies are attracted, hardworking old farmers will become flying bees and butterflies flying around in this greenhouse, pollinating every persimmon flower. Bees and butterflies have no desire. They live for flowers. Flowers kissed by bees and butterflies are fragrant and full of fruit flavor. "The world is full of knowledge, and the cultivation of human feelings is an article." Man is the embodiment of desires and needs. The tomato raised with the water of desire is perfect in appearance and shape, but God has lost it? There is a green emerald heart hidden under the bright red appearance, and it is still a tomato in my memory.
Why is tomato sauce delicious in Xinjiang? Thanks to his unique natural climate, he grew up outdoors with a large temperature difference between day and night. It has been baptized by sunshine and rain, with the sweetness of sunshine, the bitterness of storm and the fragrance of bees, so it is sour and sweet, and nature gives it a natural taste, which is the true nature of life.
Is the loss of fragrance a formal metaphor for our loss of nature and true colors? Tomatoes grow rapidly under the guidance of modern agricultural technology. He doesn't need to lure bees and butterflies to pollinate with flowers. Without the baptism of sunshine and rain, how can he smell? As long as you add a lot of chemical fertilizer to breed, it will bloom quickly, bear big and round fruits, spray fairy water, and put on the red makeup of Tsing Yi the next day. Aren't other vegetables the same? People who grow tomatoes are not tomatoes but banknotes. For tomatoes, the taste is important, but what do you need for banknotes? This is just a dull piece of paper. Cold and snobbish.
We have saved a lot of time, and our life should become very leisurely. In fact, we have become busier, because our pace is faster, our interpersonal relationships are more complicated, our lives are more complicated, and people are becoming more and more hypocritical, insidious, cunning, or insensitive and indifferent. Even if life is full of enthusiasm and prosperity, it is essentially just a dry well without real feelings.
Looking back on the past, if we don't use computers to give up mobile phones, can we have a leisurely life or return to a leisurely mood? Due to the pressure of struggle for existence and the temptation of material interests, everyone turned their eyes and energy to the outside world and no longer paid attention to their inner world. As a result, the soul shrinks and is empty, leaving only a busy body in the world.
Missing food for a certain period of time may be more about missing someone in memory and missing a certain period of time. Time refers to quicksand, aging for a period of time, always a day that can't be returned, and people that can't be found. Sweet and sour tomatoes disappeared in the tide of the times. Is it the self-destruction of tomatoes or the sorrow of the times? As time goes by, each of us is scrambling to turn ourselves into beautiful tomatoes to pay homage to this unprecedented era.
? 202 1 may 15