Making art out of flour
It's disconcerting, when I think about it, that so much of my self-identifying labels still come from outside.
A waiter at a restaurant said to us, "Since you two are foodies..." and I thought, "Am I?" I mean, I kind of aspire to being a foodie, but I figured they knew more stuff about food (Y'mean, like, how egg proteins unfold and then tangle when heated, so that they deflect light, causing the albumen to turn from clear to white in a cooked egg? Stuff like that??), and higher standards about food (Like the way you actually could taste the difference in that grass-fed, dry-aged steak you cooked the other day and decided it was, in fact, worth the 2x price tag?). So, uh, maybe I am a foodie.
Neat!
On Saturday I went to hang out with a new friend (from rock climbing), and she wanted to cook at her place so that she could make sure the food was okay for her diabetes-controlling diet. So I sat at the table and let her run her kitchen, of course. Plus, her sister was giving her plenty of suggestions. But gradually she asks me more and more questions, asking for advice (Um, put the pasta in the water now. And dump some sauce in that sauce pan. That'll do.), and by the time we got to the "Oh, nuts, I don't have a garlic press" stage, I was up and chopping ingredients.
I really think that girls our age were taught to fear kitchens. We were seldom involved in cooking, very little was made "from scratch" at home, and the marketing of "convenience foods" makes us think that cooking is some difficult, mystical art that you shouldn't even attempt without thorough cooking-school training, lest you embarrass yourself completely. The embarrassment is what I notice most amongst my friends; they're concerned they'll look stupid.
How could you be stupid for not knowing something you were never taught? Just relax about it. Besides, the girl watching you cook will just assume, if you do something wildly unconventional, that you know more than she does, because she doesn't have any kitchen confidence, either.
And food is really forgiving. There's a wide spectrum of edible, and you can kind of wing it and shimmy in just under the wire, and the spread will still be delicious and appreciated.
Except for fudge. Fudge is a pain in the ass.
So I'm watching myself in Tiffany's kitchen and I realize: I'm one of those women. Those women who can cook. Hot damn!
I made bread yesterday. The whole process took about 7 hours. Whole-wheat, with flax seeds and sesame seeds, kneaded for a full ten minutes the first time, allowed to rise a total of 3 times, brushed with milk to give it a brown crust. When you peer at the cross-section, you can make out the spiral where I rolled up the loaf. Oh, I tell you, it's really bread!
Kneading that bread, working on a wooden cutting board, spiraling it as if I were wedging clay (only much more gently), I watch how it's becoming elastic and satiny, how it isn't sticking, how my hands know the movements with deft confidence, and I smell the wholesome yeast: In that moment, I just feel so beautiful. So alive. Doing what I am meant to be doing.
A waiter at a restaurant said to us, "Since you two are foodies..." and I thought, "Am I?" I mean, I kind of aspire to being a foodie, but I figured they knew more stuff about food (Y'mean, like, how egg proteins unfold and then tangle when heated, so that they deflect light, causing the albumen to turn from clear to white in a cooked egg? Stuff like that??), and higher standards about food (Like the way you actually could taste the difference in that grass-fed, dry-aged steak you cooked the other day and decided it was, in fact, worth the 2x price tag?). So, uh, maybe I am a foodie.
Neat!
On Saturday I went to hang out with a new friend (from rock climbing), and she wanted to cook at her place so that she could make sure the food was okay for her diabetes-controlling diet. So I sat at the table and let her run her kitchen, of course. Plus, her sister was giving her plenty of suggestions. But gradually she asks me more and more questions, asking for advice (Um, put the pasta in the water now. And dump some sauce in that sauce pan. That'll do.), and by the time we got to the "Oh, nuts, I don't have a garlic press" stage, I was up and chopping ingredients.
I really think that girls our age were taught to fear kitchens. We were seldom involved in cooking, very little was made "from scratch" at home, and the marketing of "convenience foods" makes us think that cooking is some difficult, mystical art that you shouldn't even attempt without thorough cooking-school training, lest you embarrass yourself completely. The embarrassment is what I notice most amongst my friends; they're concerned they'll look stupid.
How could you be stupid for not knowing something you were never taught? Just relax about it. Besides, the girl watching you cook will just assume, if you do something wildly unconventional, that you know more than she does, because she doesn't have any kitchen confidence, either.
And food is really forgiving. There's a wide spectrum of edible, and you can kind of wing it and shimmy in just under the wire, and the spread will still be delicious and appreciated.
Except for fudge. Fudge is a pain in the ass.
So I'm watching myself in Tiffany's kitchen and I realize: I'm one of those women. Those women who can cook. Hot damn!
I made bread yesterday. The whole process took about 7 hours. Whole-wheat, with flax seeds and sesame seeds, kneaded for a full ten minutes the first time, allowed to rise a total of 3 times, brushed with milk to give it a brown crust. When you peer at the cross-section, you can make out the spiral where I rolled up the loaf. Oh, I tell you, it's really bread!
Kneading that bread, working on a wooden cutting board, spiraling it as if I were wedging clay (only much more gently), I watch how it's becoming elastic and satiny, how it isn't sticking, how my hands know the movements with deft confidence, and I smell the wholesome yeast: In that moment, I just feel so beautiful. So alive. Doing what I am meant to be doing.