#5 this is why we do it
With so much going on in the world at the moment, and the extra time I now have in my day, I can’t help but seek comfort from spending time in the kitchen cooking. It’s one of the constants in a sea of unknown. A few weeks ago, right before social-distancing efforts were stepped up, Mitch and I had the pleasure of hosting my family for the weekend and doing what we do best: cooking, eating, drinking, laughing and enjoying each other’s company. This weekend gave my mum and I the opportunity to spend some time together in the kitchen, using local ingredients to cook up a feast for our bellies to enjoy.
I was gifted a beautiful new cookbook recently, Under the Mediterranean Sun by Nadia Zerouali and Merijin Tol, and had been wanting to try it out. This seemed like the perfect opportunity. With over 300 recipes in the book, it meant choosing a few became a tricky task. We settled on the following elements:
- Yufka rolls with garlic yoghurt
- Kofte and pesto trapanese
- Flatbread
- Roasted capsicum and garlic dip
- Garden salad
While I have spent lots of time in the kitchen with my mum over the years, it was this experience that was particularly special. Perhaps it was because we had more time, or because we knew that with all going on in the world right now, rituals like this and time spent together could not be taken for granted. Regardless, it gave me an opportunity to hear from mum all about her love of cooking and why food is so special to her.
When I asked mum where her love of cooking, and in particular baking, came from, it wasn’t any surprise to hear her response. Having grown up eating her mum’s food (my nan, someone who can just about turn any ingredient into gold), she experienced delicious, home-cooked food, day in and day out. It was from this that she came to appreciate the art of home-cooking and instilled this into our home for my dad, sister and I to enjoy. Most interestingly though, mum couldn’t help but also describe to me the idea that, for her, cooking for herself and cooking for others is an act of love. A way of giving those she cooks for a little bit of her love each time. This resonated with me, perhaps because this is how I feel too. Home-cooking for us is not only an act of self-love, in that both the process of it as well as the end result makes us feel good; it’s also a way of showing and giving love to those around us in the form of something they can enjoy. I can’t help but think that a lot of other people might feel the same way, too.
Knowing that I have personally experienced many challenges and failures throughout my cooking journey, I asked mum about some of hers. As she prepared the filo pastry for the yufka rolls we would be enjoying that evening and expressed her frustration with the difficulties of working with filo pastry, she responded with “Sometimes, some of the most simple of meals can be the most challenging”. For mum, this included a typical roast (of which I shared similar frustrations with). For something supposedly rather simple, achieving both a tender and flavoursome piece of meat could be quite challenging and had proved incredibly frustrating for her over many years. Thank goodness slow cooked roasts became a thing!
Sometimes people ask me how I could be bothered to spend so much time preparing and cooking dinners, breakfasts, lunches or snacks. I have to admit, when I’m staring at one of my failed lasagnes (just ask Mitch) or eating a tasteless dumpling, I sometimes wonder the same thing. There are many evenings when an egg on toast is the only thing I feel like and sometimes when all I want is for someone else to have done the cooking. When I shared this story with mum, she agreed with this. Her response, however, I felt really hit the nail on the head as far as the argument for home-cooking goes…
“I love that when I cook, I know where the food has come from and what’s in it. You know that it’s good quality and wholesome and that you have put your love into it.”
That evening, as the four of us sat around the dining room table, mum’s comment on why she loves home-cooked food couldn’t have sung more truth. Our plates were stacked with all sorts of Mediterranean treats, our glasses filled with specially picked red wine and our hearts were happy. Yes, it had taken us most of the afternoon, the filo pastry had been frustrating, and we were concerned about the lack of flavour in the yufka rolls. Nevertheless, having been able to spend that time in the kitchen with my mum, preparing food for people that I loved with produce that was fresh and local, had well and truly made it all worth it.
This is why we do it.
