Part One
His tiny fists turn white. His mouth relaxes only to take in more air. His eyes freeze in terror. All at once as he stamps out of the kitchen into the dining room and back into the kitchen again. His screams are trapped in the back of his throat.
“Warning. Warning. Warning. Smoke alarm in the kitch-en,” sounds the device.
I pick him up and wrap him in my arms, pressing him against my chest. His body quivers and his heart hammers into mine.
“What happened?” asks my husband as he joins the fray by opening a window and then taking down the offensive alarm.
“The grill pan started to smoke. Maybe the oil overheated? None of the food is burned—but our toddler is terrified of the smoke alarm.”
I make mistakes in the kitchen. I started clean cooking or cooking from scratch about eight years ago—and I still make mistakes. I’ve offended taste buds; overcooked fish to the consistency of leather; served meat that’s still bleeding; caused fires in the oven and caused the whole house to fill with smoke; baked bread that has imploded; broken bakeware on the stovetop—who likes crunch glass or ceramic chips in their dinner?; seared my fingers and arms in the oven—thankfully, I keep an aloe plant nearby; left food on the stove or in the oven to blacken and die; and thus have caused my toddler to panic over the smoke alarm and now other automated voices, including greeting cards and unfamiliar electronic toys.
I confess to you this litany of errors to demonstrate my fallibility in the kitchen despite my successes.
I have never taken a cooking class—well, except for some cooking in Home Economics in high school—nor did my mom or grandmother explicitly teach me. I did help prepare meals with the women in my family, but the majority of the food was prepackaged and processed of the heat-and-eat or add-milk-and-bake variety. I don’t watch cooking shows regularly either. I am just an Everyman (or Everywoman). I’ve got street cred (versus book smarts) in the kitchen. I learned by trying, making mistakes, and taking chances.
So I’m not perfect. I am just like you. Wherever you are on your cooking journey, I can meet you there and help you take the next step. To start, here are ten of the most important lessons I learned along the way (in no particular order).
1. Throw out perfection
My mom used to say “she’s only Martha Stewart because she has people to help her, but you never see those people on TV or on the cover of her magazine.”
Exactly.
Martha Stewart is synonymous with perfection. Icons like her and people on cooking shows make it look so effortless. But they had help in the background before filming the preparation of the meal and most were formally educated in so-called proper technique, leaving regular people to think real cooking should be left to the professionals. (Michael Pollan agrees at 7:30 in the video below.)
So do I know how to smoothly roll a knife to chop a vegetable just like the pros? Nope. Believe me; I’ve tried. But can I cut up anything? Yes, I can. So can my husband. Will an onion be in perfect “squares”—as my husband calls them when asking how to cut a vegetable—? No, it’s likely to be chopped into various sizes. But that doesn’t affect the taste or overall appearance, so is it really important?
2. Change the recipe
Someone once told me, “Cooks are like artists, while bakers are like scientists.” In other words, cooking allows flexibility for similar outcomes, while baking which is based on chemistry demands exactness for a specific outcome, such as moist, fluffy bread or crispy cookies. Substitutions in cooking are therefore more forgiving—and you can take advantage of that by adding or subtracting similar seasonings and other ingredients and adjusting the order of recipe steps or cooking times. For instance, this week I tried a new meatloaf recipe. Most versions call for tomato paste, and I always substitute ketchup instead. It has a similar flavor profile, and we always have it on hand, saving us from buying one-more-thing at the store. (Because of the high-added-sugar content, however, my family uses a ketchup brand with a lower amount and with natural sugar.) This recipe also requires cooking the meatloaf for an hour in the oven. I was pressed for time and our usual meatloaf recipe only calls for a half-hour, so I cranked the oven up twenty-five degrees and set the kitchen timer to a half-hour. The new-recipe meatloaf was done in that time!
3. Practice regularly
Maybe you’re like me and prefer to jump into the deep end of a pool when first getting wet. Maybe you prefer to wade slowly in the shallow end to get your body acclimated to the water. Either way, you get wet and you will swim. It’s the same with cooking: it doesn’t matter how frequently you practice in the beginning, but that you practice regularly. So if your schedule does not allow much extra time right now, practice once a month, twice a month, or once a week. If you feel like your time is more flexible or you’re like me and just want to jump in, practice several times a week to every day. One hour for making each non-processed meal (of the standard four servings) should suffice.
4. Set goals
To motivate yourself and commit to practicing cooking regularly, set goals. Whether you’re a deep-ender (that is, those who practice every day) or a steady-wader (that is, those who practice one to four times a month), I recommend setting a goal of thirty to forty days of following your practice plan. The popular weight loss and processed-food detox diet, Whole30, uses a thirty day format to jump-start people into healthier eating. Science says it takes forty days to build a new habit. However long you decide, be honest with yourself to find the zone of proximal development: the length of time should not be too easy or too daunting. Alternatively or additionally, set a goal about the kind of food or meals you will create. When I committed to cooking non-processed meals daily, I wanted to learn how all my favorite foods could be made by hand: ice cream, bagels, bread, croissants, quiche, granola, cheese, yogurt, jerky, etc. I have yet to conquer everything on that list, but it was enough to inspire and motivate me to keep cooking in the beginning of my journey eight years ago. Now cooking is a habit and a way of life that I’ll never change.
5. Get someone else to do the dishes
I got lucky. My husband dutifully believes we are partners and helpmates in marriage, so convincing him to clean up after I prepare a meal was easy. All I had to do was ask. Maybe that’s all you need to do is ask your partner or kids. Maybe you’ve already tried—but it’s a conversation that you could bring up again. My mom and grandmother were notoriously particular about kitchen clean-up and would often complain about having the sole responsibility in the kitchen. Our family was small, so I was taught the proper cleaning protocol as the only child. As an adult, I realized that the reason my dad and grandfather did not help was because they were exiled from the kitchen. Maybe it was a generational/cultural expectation that did not allow the women in my family to relinquish some of their kitchen duties. Thankfully, that gender role is dissolving, making the idea, everybody eats, so everybody should help, quite popular. (See the meme above.) And if no amount of imploring or praying moves your partner or kids to support you in the kitchen, maybe paper plates and plastic utensils should be added to your grocery list.
What have you learned from your cooking journey so far? What advice would you give to others?
Stay tuned for Part Two next week where the next five Tested Truths to Conquer Clean Cooking will be revealed!