#2 is sick and honestly in perspective it hasn’t been nearly as terrible as it’s been in the years past with the girls getting sick all the time. Perhaps the world has kind of caught up to the backlog of colds, flus and other gross ailments and bugs. Perhaps my kids’ immune systems have grown stronger from the onslaughts of colds, flus and other gross ailments and bugs over their short existences. Maybe both.
Back to the point though, my youngest is sick right now, and it’s never easy on the soul as a parent when your kid is struggling through fever, discomfort and a body in revolt. Nothing wants to be kept down, but she needs to stay hydrated, but consuming anything too fast results in it coming back up, so it’s a delicate game of trying to feed slow and steady so she doesn’t starve, but not too much lest it all comes back up and defeats the purpose.
Feed a cold, starve a fever, is what I always remember hearing. I sure as heck didn’t really feel like eating when I was ailing just days prior.
Regardless, I felt it was probably best to keep any foods simple and stay away from the dairy and yogurts that my kids tend to eat when things are normal, but the options weren’t that many at my house which hasn’t yet fully reset and restocked since we returned from vacation.
That being said, given the circumstances of #2’s condition, I decided to take a page out of my mom’s book and take a stab at making jook (죽) which is basically a porridge made out of rice, or as lesser Asians know it as congee. It was something my mom often made for me when I was a kid and suffering from keeping anything complex down, and I had memories of just how soothing it could be when you weren’t feeling well.
It also didn’t help-actually helped that I woke up at 5:30 this morning for no real reason, so I had an adequate amount of time to simmer and render down the rice and liquid before the kids woke up, and make a halfway passable 죽. The real question mark was going to be, would my kids like it? They’re at a finicky eating stage in life currently, but they do like it when I make fried rice, so there’s a chance that they might like rice in a different presentation, right??
Fortunately, after some morning snuggles, an explanation that the following recipe is something that halmoni (grandma) made for me when I was a kid, and I was going to make it for her, #2 actually ended up liking the 죽, much to my joyful satisfaction. I mean, it’s basically mushy rice in a porridge consistency, and it takes to the same flavors as any ordinary rice. So with a drop or two of soy sauce to give it some flavor, it has the same taste, but also goes down really smooth and is easy to digest, and I’m hoping that the pot of the 죽 I made can last another day or two and by then I hope she’s all better.
Unsurprisingly, #1 saw what her sister was eating and was curious, and turns out that she thought it was pretty good as well. Great knowledge to have for when inevitably she gets sick too, that both my kids like the same stuff that I liked when I was a kid, and it does make me happy to do something like my mom did for me, for my own kids when they’re sick.
