My godchild got married recently and I went a bit nuts trying to think of just the right wedding gift to give her. She’s a very special young lady and, though I’ve never met him, the word I’ve received is that her new husband is a very special young man. So you can see that no ordinary gift would do.
After much perusing of catalogs and Internet sites, I decided that the best gift I could give her was a book of family recipes. The recipes would range from traditional dishes that have been in my family since we sailed from Italy, to a great Chinese spareribs recipe I once found in a Sunday magazine, to recipes I made up in desperation on nights when there was little in the refrigerator and I didn’t want to eat out alone.
As I was putting this book together, I started seeing articles in various periodicals that said that people who cook at home do not tend to get as obese as people who eat out a lot. So maybe by giving her this book, I’m giving her more than a wedding present. Maybe I’m giving her something that will ultimately benefit her long-term health and that of the children I am secretly longing for her to have.
Not that anyone would call some of my family recipes healthy. They come from an era where you just couldn’t get enough butter, eggs and cheese. But over the years I’ve found that with a little modification, they can be healthy and still taste great.
The thing though that I most want her to learn from this book is that cooking should be, above all else, a fun and creative activity. I think this gets lost in today’s busy world where pots have been replaced by take out containers and the smell of food in the kitchen means the microwave has finished it’s reheating function.
My cousin Toni has a theory that if a recipe is available, use it. She feels it’s the result of someone who spent a long time working on it and so it gives you the best possible outcome.
I think that holds true only up to a point. When I’m in the kitchen, my motto is “Don’t be afraid to experiment and don’t be afraid to fail”. Of course, it helps if you keep a big hungry dog around who will think that most of your failures are manna from heaven.
And if you can get your spouse in the kitchen with you…well, you just can’t believe the great conversations you can have while chopping onions or how truly peaceful just stirring a pot can be after a crazed day at work. Cooking from scratch forces you to stay in one place and focus on something very mechanical which leaves your mind free to daydream and find its quiet place.
And for the working mom, I would just like to remind her that a wooden spoon can be your best friend. You can stir the pot with it, scratch your back with it and whack a recalcitrant kid on the head with it as they try to sneak by you in the kitchen after doing something wrong – all without moving from your original position at the stove.
I know that in my family, food played a role that non-Italians might find too central. And I am old enough to know that it is not necessarily healthy to equate food with love. But that’s the way it was when I was growing up. I can never eat that Sunday sauce or bite into a piece of strufoli without wonderful memories flooding back to me – memories of a childhood filled with love, laughter, cousins, aunts, uncles and food. Lots and lots of food.
And that alone should be a good enough reason to find the time to cook meals at home. Not just because it’s healthier for you and your family, but because when you get old and your memory starts to slip a little, there is nothing like the aroma of some favorite family dish baking in the over to jog it and bring back the good times. The smell of reheated Chinese takeout just doesn’t carry the same punch.
I guess if I had any philosophy to pass on to my godchild as she starts her marriage, it would be to live her life with a wooden spoon in one hand and her husband’s heart – as reached through his stomach – in the other. And to never let go of either.