Eggs.

For dinner last night, we cooked meat on a griddle, then wrapped it in romaine lettuce with hoisin sauce.

"I'd like an egg," Tom says. "Can we grill an egg on here?"

My mother went to the fridge and brought out two eggs. She wiped clean one corner of the griddle, poured on canola oil, and cracked the egg against the side of the griddle. She poured the egg onto the griddle, where it quickly bubbled and turned white.

"Look how easy this is, Tom," I said. "You should buy a griddle, or a George Foreman grill."

"It looks easy because Mom is cooking it," he replies. "If I'm doing it, it won't be easy."

"Come on," I say.

Then Tom told a story. "Mom taught me how to make poached eggs. You put oil in a pan, heat it, and then put in the egg. So I was doing it at home. I put the oil in the pan and heated it. It didn't seem to get hot -- there wasn't much smoke coming off of it. So I turned up the heat, and kept waiting. After about 20 seconds, the oil suddenly all turned black, and then the pot cracked."

I laughed and laughed. I translated into chinese for my mother, and she laughed and laughed. "How could this be?" she said.