食即是命，世道紛亂，飯仍得吃。命即選擇，吃甚麼好，在秋天實屬一大煩惱，煩在食材太過精彩。
To eat is to live. The world may be in disarray, but dinner must still be had. And to live is to choose — which, in autumn, becomes a genuine predicament, for the season's larder is embarrassingly good.
秋刀、沙甸
Saury & Sardine
小弟認為秋天食材之王必屬秋刀和沙甸兩種魚。隨着海水溫度下降，原來長直魚體脂肪漸長。夏天太瘦偏腥無咬口，冬天太胖則過膩，秋季魚肉油脂比例平衡，少少腩仔圓碌碌咁就剛剛好。
The crown of autumn belongs, surely, to two fish: the saury and the sardine. As the sea cools, those long, lean bodies begin to lay down fat. In summer they run too thin — faintly fishy, nothing to bite on; by winter, too rich by half. Autumn strikes the balance: flesh and oil in proportion, a modest little belly, pleasingly plump. Just so.
如要網燒，劏肚先擺上架嗰班人係正傻仔，魚腸那少許甘甘苦苦才是最佳風味。做刺身的話，可以配搭冰涼清酒或梳打水，使陣濃厚魚油甘香在個口中浪浪下。想再勁一點，11月正好是北海道大黑秋刀登場。假如全個秋天只有一種味道，此為不二之選。
For the grill: anyone who guts the fish before it meets the flame has, frankly, taken leave of their senses — that trace of bitter-sweetness in the innards is the best of it. As sashimi, take it with chilled sake or soda water, and let the oily richness wash about the mouth in slow waves. For the ambitious, November brings the great Hokkaido saury to market. If autumn were permitted a single taste, this would be mine.
野菌
Wild Mushrooms
當刻腦中所想是碗野菌飯。料材不需要多，白飯加堆菇就夠。想要加添「罪惡感」，扔嚿牛油落去一齊煮。
What comes to mind, at this very moment, is a bowl of mushroom rice. It wants very little: white rice, a heap of mushrooms. For a proper sense of sin, drop in a knob of butter and let it all steam together.
各地山林歷過雨季，鮮艷野菌相繼冒頭。來到收獲季節，如有能力窮奢極侈，一生人必須來一場松茸盛會。小弟僅在小時候在間高級餐廳炒散「打到隻貓」，吃完才知碗中嗰碌是松茸，未入口已嗅得濃烈芳香，食落極潤爽滑。之後打個嗝，濃烈香氣由胃部回湧上口鼻，又嘆一次。
The hills, having endured the rains, now push up their bright crop. Come harvest, anyone with the means to be truly extravagant owes themselves, once in a lifetime, a matsutake feast. As a boy I worked odd shifts at a rather grand restaurant, run off my feet; only after eating did I learn that the morsel in my bowl had been matsutake. The perfume announced itself before the first bite; the flesh was sleek, almost voluptuous. Then came the burp — the aroma surged up from the stomach, back through nose and throat, and the pleasure came round a second time.
由於松茸實在貴到飛起，之後很多個秋天陪着我的，是各式平靚正美味。幾年前去大阪，居酒屋個負責人竟然係波蘭人，拎住嚿牛肝菌在我面前揈了揈，好自豪咁講：「Poland has the best mushroom.」小弟一試，食落有陣松樹幽香，承惠不過300日圓。近日雞油菇同環柄菇亦是當造，切粒煲湯大雜燴又得，原始一點成嚿拎去燒亦得，爽脆清新。
Matsutake being priced somewhere near scandal, the autumns since have been kept company by humbler delights. Some years ago in Osaka, the man running the izakaya turned out, of all things, to be Polish. He waved a porcino in front of me and declared, with great pride: "Poland has the best mushroom." One bite — a quiet breath of pine — for all of three hundred yen. Chanterelles and parasols are in season as I write: diced into a broth with whatever else is about, or thrown whole onto the fire, primitive fashion. Crisp, and clean.
栗子、南瓜
Chestnut & Pumpkin
各種野菌之外，最能代表秋天的一定係金黃色食材。日本人會吃栗子飯，我則會再加南瓜。米粒之間粒粒金黃，本身已經秋意濃烈；打開鍋蓋那刻白煙沖天，隨之而來係飽滿米香之中，可以清楚聞到栗子嗰種粗獷、南瓜嗰種香甜。幾種澱粉質之間各有特色，又唔會互相搶味。
Beyond the mushrooms, nothing declares autumn like food the colour of gold. The Japanese make chestnut rice; I add pumpkin. Gold scattered through the grains is autumn enough by itself — then the lid lifts, the steam goes up, and there within the fullness of the rice you can tell them apart distinctly: the chestnut's rough edge, the pumpkin's sweetness. Three starches, each with its own character, none shouting the others down.
大閘蟹
Hairy Crab
最後要講這種最難吃得大方好睇，在說的是大閘蟹。坊間有謂九月圓臍十月尖，即係九月要食乸，十月要食公蟹。於是乎我會在九月底或十月初一次過隊晒公乸。小弟常見人拆開個蓋舐走啲膏就扔，好很浪費。大閘蟹蟹肉本身無甚風味，但若曉得全隻拆解，撈埋啲膏一齊隊，是癡線級美味。再者蟹膏本身味道頗濃，又無口感可言，加上蟹肉就能拉返勻。
Last comes the one that is hardest to eat with any dignity: the hairy crab. The old saying holds — round navels in the ninth month, pointed in the tenth; females in September, males in October. So at the turn of the month I see off both sexes in a single sitting. I have watched people lift the carapace, lick out the roe, and abandon the rest — a waste that ought, by rights, to carry a custodial sentence. The meat alone has little to say for itself; but take the whole creature apart properly, fold the meat through the roe, and it becomes delicious to the point of derangement. The roe, after all, is rich but has no texture; the meat pulls it back into line.
很多朋友說拆蟹很麻煩。我則強調吃蟹講修為：要吃得不疾不徐、不讓成手黃甘甘，不使蟹殼掉得半天半地；同時還須分解全面而且速度高，以免隻蟹冷掉錯失最佳風味。一年才吃那麼一兩次，一絲都不能浪費。
Friends complain that the picking is tedious. Eating crab, I maintain, is a discipline: neither hurried nor idle; fingers unstained with yellow; no shell flung to the four corners of the table; and withal thorough, and swift, before the crab goes cold and the moment is lost. It comes but once or twice a year. Not one thread of it is to be wasted.