The other night I made dinner and it was not up to my standards. I may have given it some modicum effort, but I didn’t show it the attention it needed to become really tasty. Sometimes it’s like that with dinner. Maybe I was cooking for convenience and not pleasure or flavor. I’ve been cooking a long time. My mom taught me to cook when I was eight and I’ve been in the kitchen ever since. My sister not so much, but she’s come into her own over the years. As a wife and mother she didn’t get much choice, but she enjoys moments of being in the kitchen and sharing time with people she loves. Each of us brings our own style into the kitchen. My mom rarely looks at a recipe more than once or twice. She has things she’s been making forever. Things may vary a little from when she started making them, ingredients adapted to diets and what not. But the base is still there. You can count on certain things to appear at every holiday and her lemon bars will always taste better than anyone else’s. My sister, on the other hand, is newer to the joy of cooking. She’s developed a style of weeknight quickness that suits her busy life with husband and child. Quick recipes and repeats of things that worked, sometimes things that didn’t (we’ll remember next time) are the way of working mom. I cook because I want to. There is no one I have to answer to if dinner isn’t ready at 6. When I’m in the kitchen I make what I feel like. What is fresh and smells good. What flavors work well and balance each other. I use these and a background of experimenting with a little of every style to hone my skills. I find that I am a much more patient cook these days. I like that.
Each of us is in the kitchen often and we all have favorite dishes to make. Funny, they all have a sauce of some kind. Of course we all have our own ways of making sauce. My mom makes it the same way she has all her life, from memory, because that’s the easiest way for her. She knows just how it will taste and that is what she wants. My sister opens the jar and puts it in the pan. On occasion she’ll add some garlic to spice it up or some seasoning the crossed her line of sight. Her husband likes it and her child is okay so it’s tasty for her. It works for her time table and suits needs right now. For both of them the method isn’t chosen for flavor first, but convenience. It is about need for food and really has nothing to do with what sauce they chose. For me, the sauce is the focal point. The sauce needs attention and patience to reach it’s full potential. Sometimes you need to stand there and stir the whole time, other times you just give it a little stir and room to develop. Always, though, you check for seasoning and add what it needs to balance the flavor. When it’s just right the satisfaction is amazing.
I think how we approach our relationships are reflected in the way we cook. We cook the same thing over and over because it’s easy. Other times we do the little things to spice it up. And still others we are watching, stirring, and balancing flavors. There are occasions when we watch too closely or are impatient with the dish and it turns out badly. The beauty is, it’s just one dish. I get to make more. If the food is consistently bad, change the way you cook. But if it’s good, you must be doing something right. And a tasty dish is a wonderful thing…. I just might have to make dinner.
