The Anlan Style of Thai Food

By Liu Dongli

“Basil Ultraviolet,” a wine with Basil leaves; “Tom Yum Forest,” a wine with lemon leaves and lemongrass which tastes like Tom Yum Soup;“Ruby,” a wine with rose snow....

All these fancy names came from a Thai girl at Red Basil Thai Restaurant, who rendered the giant menu her own creative touch.

This Thai girl, Wipawee Kruakam, has a Chinese name Anlan. A decade ago, she had yearned to be in the city of Wuhan in China. In 2007, she studied at Khon Kaen University in Thailand, where she met her Chinese teacher from Wuhan University, from whom she learned about the vast East Lake,the beautiful romantic cherry blossoms, and the ceaselessly rolling Yangtze River.

During the summer vacation in her junior year, she came to Wuhan University for the first time for a two-month exchange program. In 2011, Anlan returned to Wuhan University to pursue her post-graduate degree in business management. Three years later, she learned by chance that a Thai restaurant called Red Basil was opening in Wuhan. She applied and successfully became the “cultural ambassador” of the restaurant, acting as a translator between the Thai chefs and the Chinese customers and staff.Since then, Anlan has started a whole new life, and she has become determined to introduce Thai foods to China.

In order to make the customers know and accept Thai food,Anlan racked her brains. “Names of the dishes should be crystal clear instead of being confusing or unintelligible.” Anlan says this because when she first came to China, she was confused by many dish names. “Where is the fish when the name is ‘Fishy Pork’?” “Oh my God, what is‘Couple’s Lung Slices’? Is that even edible?” “Are there Ants in‘Ants in the Tree’?”… Anlan still felt astonished when recalling all these.

So, Anlan has been very careful with the translation of dish names. She intends to make the names easy to remember and understand, blending Chinese culture and Chinese people’s customary understanding into it, so that it sounds enticing and inviting. Not long ago, the restaurant launched a deepfried shrimp dish, which is made from “Tamarind” juice from the Thai fruit of the same name. The juice is added to the fried big shrimp, making the shrimp taste more delicious. Anlan named it“Tamarind Fried Big Shrimp.”

Anlan understands that China has an extensive and profound food culture, which includes various ways of cooking such as stir-frying, steaming, braising,stewing, deep-frying, frying,roasting, and so on. Therefore, in order to accurately translate the dish names, Anlan often refers to her Chinese dictionary as well as her Chinese colleagues over and over again. Sometimes she also consults her guests and passes on accurate opinions to the chefs so that a mutual understanding can be reached over the form and content of a dish.

加了羅勒葉的酒品，她為其取名叫“羅勒紫外線”；帶有檸檬葉、香茅的，類似冬陰功味道的酒，她譯成“冬陰森林”；有玫瑰雪的酒被翻譯成“紅寶石”……

在紅羅勒泰餐廳，厚厚的菜單成了一個(gè)泰國女孩的創(chuàng)作園地。

她叫安蘭，泰國人，十多年前便對(duì)武漢深懷向往。2007年，她進(jìn)入泰國孔敬大學(xué)學(xué)習(xí)，她的漢語老師來自中國的武漢大學(xué)。從老師那里，她知道了煙波浩渺的東湖、唯美浪漫的櫻花，奔騰萬里的長(zhǎng)江……

大三那年假期，她第一次來到武漢大學(xué)，進(jìn)行為期兩個(gè)月的學(xué)習(xí)交流； 2011年，安蘭再次來到武漢大學(xué)，攻讀企業(yè)管理專業(yè)研究生。三年后一個(gè)偶然的機(jī)會(huì)，武漢一家叫紅羅勒的泰餐廳開業(yè)，她應(yīng)聘成為餐廳的文化大使，擔(dān)任泰國大廚與中國顧客之間的翻譯。從此，安蘭開始了一段全新的生活。她決意要把泰國的美食傳遞到中國來。

如何讓顧客更好地理解、接受泰國菜，安蘭費(fèi)了不少心思。“菜名應(yīng)該讓人一目了然，不能讓人不知所云。”剛來中國時(shí)，安蘭被不少菜名弄得云里霧里，鬧了不少笑話。“明明寫的是‘魚香肉絲’，可哪里有魚呢？”“天啊，‘夫妻肺片’是怎么做的？能吃嗎？”“‘螞蟻上樹’里有螞蟻嗎？”……至今安蘭回憶起來，還是那么詫異。

鑒于自己的親身經(jīng)歷，她在取菜名時(shí)非常用心，使翻譯出來的菜名盡量淺顯易懂。她把中國文化和中國人對(duì)菜名的習(xí)慣理解溶入菜名里，勾起客人的好奇和食欲。前不久，餐廳推出一道油炸蝦，做法是用泰國一種叫“羅望”的水果擠出的酸汁，淋在炸過的大頭蝦上，使蝦的味道更加鮮美。安蘭給它取名“羅望油炸大頭蝦”。

安蘭認(rèn)識(shí)到，中國飲食文化博大精深，爆炒、清炒、蒸、燜、燉、炸、煎……各種烹飪方式大相徑庭。為了準(zhǔn)確翻譯菜品，安蘭不得不一遍遍地翻閱詞典、請(qǐng)教中國同事。有時(shí)候，她還會(huì)征求客人意見，把準(zhǔn)確的意見傳遞給主廚，確保認(rèn)識(shí)統(tǒng)一，使菜品的形式與內(nèi)容完美相接。

以安蘭的中文水平，回泰國當(dāng)一名教師，做一名中泰文化交流大使，并不是難事，可她并不想這樣。“我喜歡中國的生活，也喜歡與中國人打交道。將來，即使回到家鄉(xiāng)，我也會(huì)選擇在一家華人工廠工作。”

后來我們才知道，安蘭對(duì)中國的情愫是打小種下的。安蘭的外婆是中國人，她和妹妹從小就在外婆懷里聆聽一個(gè)個(gè)中國故事。如今，妹妹也學(xué)成了中國通，在家鄉(xiāng)的一所高中擔(dān)任中文老師。◆

Anlan (right) with Thai actress Mo Amena (middle) in Red Basil安蘭（右）和泰圖女明星Mo Amena（中）在餐廳合影

With her language proficiency in Chinese, Anlan may easily become a teacher and ambassador for Chinese-Thai cultural exchange in Thailand, but that’s not what she hopes for. “I like the life here in China. I also enjoy making friends with Chinese people. In the future, even if I return to my hometown, I will choose to work in a Chinese factory.”

We learned later that Anlan’s feelings towards China were actually planted at a very young age. Her grandmother was Chinese, and she told her and her sister a lot of Chinese stories when they were little. Today, her younger sister has also learned Chinese well and is now a Chinese teacher at a high school in her hometown.◆