How Cooking Dinner Changed My Life

Once upon a time, I was a busy working girl in downtown Boston, working at a financial firm where I met my husband, and I had lots and lots of opportunities to go out to dinner. I loved good food, especially when really talented people made it.

Then I got married. We lived in Rochester, NY our first year of marriage. I knew no one, my husband traveled for his job in finance, and aside from a few date nights and work dinners, I mostly ate solo. I was teaching Philosophy 101 at a nearby college (which was super interesting and hilarious) and on my way home, I would stop at Wegman’s, an enormous grocery store that has literally everything under the sun in their aisles. Everything. I had lots of time and lots of amazing ingredients, and a bookshelf of cookbooks we got for our wedding. I also had memories of growing up with really good food, and my love of cooking began. That year I cooked crab legs as big as your arm and a simple but delicious roast chicken. I perfected filet mignon and failed at terrines. I cooked salmon with cream sauce, pasta with homemade rustic tomato sauce, and vegetables braised in wine. I was isolated, but I was also busy. I had a lot to learn if I wanted to eat like I did at restaurants.

Then I had kids. What felt like isolation before now felt like frozen tundra. Now I was alone and unable to leave the house on a whim. And my husband still traveled. So I stayed home and while my kids slept I would read Bon Appetite cover to cover and make ratatouille (a revelation) and lemon orzo soup, warm goat cheese frisee salad and quiche. My kitchen was my best friend, and my stove was my vehicle to go anywhere. Just like books let me travel the world, so could food. Thailand through curry, the South of France through bouillabaisse, Italy through pesto.

When my third child was born, I watched Ina and Giada while I nursed. I wrote down recipes with a pen and paper, pausing the show and making notes. I read Julia Child’s ‘My Life in France’ and MFK Fisher, James Beard and Michael Pollack – anyone who was having a conversation about food. I was listening.

There was a night shortly after our third was born when I had a sitter to help me put the kids down while my husband traveled. She came in and I had made a dish by Ina Garten; something complicated with aioli on top, the whir of the food processor greeting her when she came in, and she laughed. You just had a baby! Maybe keep the food simple! She was older and wiser and all of that. And she was right, but I just had a baby! I hadn’t been able to eat raw eggs for 9 months. That aioli was freedom for me.

My kids got older and they started to love good food. Dinner became not just my passport, but theirs too. My oldest daughter loves shrimp and mussels, my youngest pasta and soups, and my sons just love everything. And four kids means we still don’t eat out a ton, but now it is treated like an event, like the celebratory affair that food should be.

But all those nights at home, all that time belly up to the stove, was as rich and lovely as any restaurant. Having to cook dinner, day in and day out meant that I had to craft our quality of life with food, its flavors and ingredients, its combinations and history. The amount of garlic or butter or lemons we had on hand became the currency of our happiness. And even though some seasons mean we have to do the simplest of meals because of hectic schedules, cooking dinner will always bring us back to an equilibrium, a pace of life where we have to slow down in order to eat well. It will always link us to seasonal living, since summer means fresh tomatoes and corn and blueberries and ice cream and winter will keep us craving soup and stew and hot chocolate. Living in seasons is part of the joy of food. But as I look back now, the seasons I have the most time to cook are my happiest. I love good take out sushi as much as the next girl, but too many nights of that make me feel disconnected from something essential.

Even though there were many times over the last ten years where the glass felt half empty because I no longer had happy hours and chef tasting menus and Saturday mornings to sleep in, or because the strain of cleaning the kitchen again made my shoulders tense, I can see now that every day I get to create something for dinner is a joy. That sharing a table with loved ones is one of the best things life has to offer, even if there is always someone who spills and someone who interrupts. I can see now that my life of cooking dinner, of selecting ingredients that are beautiful while they are at school, opening wine while they tell stories about their day, and sharing good food together makes my glass more then half full – it’s over flowing.

Someday, before I know it, they will have to work until 9 and leave for college. And when they do, I will savor every memory, and learn how to cook something new. And I’ll keep a pot of whatever it is on the stove for them, in case they come home hungry.