每当经过Svetlana Rukhelman的时候，能让我回忆起的总是乌克兰传统菜肴-奥利维尔沙拉。它主要是煮过的土豆、萝卜、鸡蛋、腊肠和切成小立方块的腌制咸菜混合在一起，并与罐装的豆子和蛋黄酱一起放入巨大的陶瓷罐里。这是一道精致的菜肴，只有在特殊场合如生日晚宴和聚会时才会拿出来享用。但它同时也象征一种礼节，是餐桌上头菜里面唯一不能少的一道菜，无论是哪家亲戚朋友举办宴会。
可笑的是，即使这么多年，我对各种菜肴的饮食习惯也在不断的进化，沙拉却始终不是我喜欢的那道菜。在我很小的时候，我喜欢上土豆，继而开始喜欢腌制咸菜和腊肠。
———那种酸甜酥软的口味永远不会失去魅力，但接下来，是让人难以下咽的绿豆，我每次都要花费20分钟将那道菜里的豆子拣出来。所以近来，我不得不屈服于一个事实：权宜之计，菜里面的每一个成分，都要尽情享用。
这看起来似乎有些奇怪，要写这么长的篇幅去赞美一道我并不十分喜欢的菜肴。但是烹饪给人带来的美好回忆，不在乎我们是否找到了食物的味美之处，而是在于那次晚宴、那些人们，以及有了这些食物，而营造的温暖气氛。在我的印象里，沙拉出现的每一次宴会，都营造出了欢欣热闹的场面：将可折叠餐桌伸展到最长、从邻居家借来的椅子、纯白的桌布、溢满饮料的水晶酒杯、锃亮的镀银餐具、白色餐巾、3种不同大小的精致瓷盘从小到大依次叠放、从厨房飘逸出来弥漫客厅的芳香。父亲带我去购物，却总是为穿何种装束为难，以及种种从往日千篇一律的生活中找寻到的其他总能令人开心的种种事情。
虽然理论上听起来很简单，准备沙拉却是相当复杂的过程，通常需要花费半个或一个上午的时间，还需要一个烧柴的人。起初，我负责给煮熟的土豆削皮，这是一项不需要刀具和其他器具的任务，虽然效率并不高，但我很喜欢做这个。当我还是5岁小孩子的时候，坐在厨房的桌子旁边，将土豆的皮削掉好几层，我的母亲和我会坦诚交流，至于聊得话题已记不清楚，但我知道，那是我永远不会疲倦的话题。
最终，我母亲教会我怎么切土豆，然后是腊肠和腌制咸菜，怎么剥鸡蛋壳，以及搅拌蛋黄酱。其中有一道程序是让我记忆犹新的，就是切鸡蛋的时候，我们用鸡蛋切割机，一次切一个煮熟的鸡蛋。没有什么比看着这个更让人开心了：七个像天线一样，排列像监狱里的围栏一样整齐的齿刃，从光滑、柔软的椭圆形的鸡蛋上划过。
分析
这篇ESSAY，通过作者描述童年的记忆和家庭的经历，以及一种作者所经历的家乡文化传统，让我们更加了解他。奥利维尔沙拉是一种在乌克兰和俄罗斯一种很精致的菜肴，为描述的主题。其成功之处，在于令人惊奇的描述能力。读者眼中看到的是令人垂涎欲滴的菜肴和作者美好童年的画面。
ESSAY并没有交代沙拉的文化根源，直到文章结尾也没有交代，不免让人有些失望。这种技巧恰恰让读者好奇，带着这种好奇和对这道菜肴的不熟悉一直读下去，全神贯注地看文章，并想要找到答案。直到最后揭露了谜底，虽然读者对这个答案并不是非常满意。
不看ESSAY中展现的描述力道，读者也可以了解到关于作者或者奥利维尔沙拉文化的一些具体细节，作为作者童年的背景支撑。特别是给大多数对此文化不熟悉，却很想了解作者传统文化精髓的读者来讲，再多些这样的细节，会更大限度的增加ESSAY的力量。
ESSAY原文赏析
ESSAY10：Salade Olivier
By Svetlana Rukhelman For as long as I can remember, there was always the salade Olivier. It consisted of boiled potatoes, carrots, eggs, bologna and pickles diced into tiny cubes and mixed into a giant enamel pot together with canned peas and mayonnaise. It was considered a delicacy, and prepared only on special occasions such as birthday and dinner parties. But it was also a ritual, the only component of the first course which was never absent from a dinner table, no matter which of our relatives or friends was throwing the feast.
Ironically, the salade Olivier was never my favorite food, though the attitude of my taste buds to the dish did evolve through the years. In my earliest childhood, I favored the compliant potatoes, then began to lean toward the pickles and bologna
– that sweet-and-sour, crunchy-and-soft combination that never loses its appeal –and next passed a phase in which the green peas appeared so abhorrent that I would spend twenty minutes picking every pea I could find out of my serving. Only recently did I resign myself to the fact that all the ingredients must be consumed simultaneously for maximum enjoyment as well as for the sake of expediency.
It may seem odd, then, to be writing in such length in praise of a dish one does not particularly like. But culinary memories are determined not so much by whether we found a food tasty, but by the events, people, and atmospheres of which the food serves as a reminder. In my mind, the very making of the salade has always been associated with the joyful bustle that accompanied the celebrations for which the dish was prepared: the unfolding of the dinner table to its full length, the borrowing of chairs from neighbors, the starched white tablecloths, simmering crystal wineglasses, polished silverware, white napkins, delicate porcelain plates of three different sizes stacked one on top of another, the aroma floating from the kitchen all through the apartment, my father taking me on special shopping errands, the wonderful dilemma of “what to wear?” and myriad other pleasant deviations from the monotony of everyday existence.
Though simple in theory, the preparation of the salade Olivier was a formidable undertaking which occupied half the morning and all but one of the stove burners. At first it was my responsibility to peel the boiled potatoes the one task which did not require the use of a knife or other utensil, and one which I performed lovingly, albeit inefficiently. As I sat at the kitchen table, my five-year-old fingers covered in several layers of potato skin, my mother and I would lead heart-to-heart discussions, whose topics I no longer remember, but of which I never tired.
Eventually, my mother introduced me to the Dicing of the Potatoes, and then to the Dicing of the Bologna, the Dicing of the Pickles, the Shelling of the Eggs and the Stirring in of the Mayonnaise as well. But there was one stage of the process I found especially mesmerizing. It was the Dicing of the Eggs, carried out one hard-boiled egg at a time with the help of an egg-cutter. Nothing was more pleasing to the eye than the sight of those seven wire-like blades, arranged like prison bars, slicing through the smooth, soft ellipsoid.
Today, we still make the salade Olivier on some formal occasions, and, as before, I sometimes participate. And every time I see the eggslicer or smell the pickles, I am reminded of our Kiev apartment, of those much-anticipated birthday parties, of the joy I felt as I helped my mother cook: of all the things which made my childhood a happy one.
ANALYSIS
This essay seeks to introduce us to the author via a description of the author’s childhood conditions and family experiences as well as experiences from the author’s cultural heritage. The salade Olivier, a delicacy in both Ukranian and Russian diets, serves as the central organizational motif for this description.
The essay’s power comes from its amazing descriptive qualities. The reader is given a vivid and detailed picture of both the salade and much of the author’s childhood.
The essay also entices the reader by deliberately omitting a description of the salade’s cultural origins until the very end of the text. This technique forces the reader to move through the essay with puzzling questions about the salade’s origins and the reader’s unfamiliarity with such a dish, motivating the reader to remain engrossed in the work and seek out the answers of interest. Only in the end are things revealed, and even then the reader may not be fully satisfied.
Despite the essay’s great descriptive power, however, the reader is given few specific details about the author or the Unkrainian culture that serves as the backdrop for the author’s childhood. Including more such details could dramatically increase the essay’s strength, especially given the unfamiliarity of most readers with the culture that stands at the core of the author’s heritage.
注：ESSAY出自哈佛大学成功ESSAY50篇之第一版
