Dreams of cherries, a late-night dive

This post comes after a sleepless night.

Not from the news, or even a sick child. From a video, posted to some Facebook group, about a medieval Chinese recipe.

A young woman, dressed as a Tang-dynasty beauty in a flowing gown, prepares a translucent dessert filled with cherries. She adds sugar to draw out their sweetness.

Yingtao biluo

A chewy cherry strudel.

Was it real?

Is any of it real? An image generated by Gemini based on existing descriptions, with the usual historical liberties. Note that white sugar was not yet a common household item in the Tang dynasty.

Like many people, I have bad habits. One is spending the last twenty minutes of my day scrolling social media, trying to quiet an unquiet mind. Lately that mind has been especially restless—long days as a college professor and mother, a recent burst of intellectual energy from teaching my course on the history of dietary advice.

But the moment I saw that video, I had doubts. Was this wishful thinking? Or was this actually something someone once ate—in China, of all places?...

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