Your Friend, The Kitchen. Really?
Here’s a link to an editorial called Your friend, the kitchen in today’s LA Times. A quick google shows that the author, Paul Roberts, has just produced a book called The End of Food as a follow up to an earlier book called The End of Oil. I’ve not read either of them. Doomsday literature is not my favorite genre even though I realize that overstatement may produce useful and timely action.
So no comments on the End of Food but, yes, comments on the editorial. The gist is that we should return to home-cooked food because it’s “healthier, safer and better tasting” and “much cheaper than the factory version.” Give up some of the 240 minutes we spend on television (Americans that is) and up the 30 minutes we spend in the kitchen.
There seems to be some secret glee in many quarters about every increase in food prices, every food scare because it will somehow make us more moral. And being more moral always seems to involve home cooking and that cheap, safe, tasty, healthful home-cooked food.
Now I’m a home cook and have been ever since I left my parents’ home. I work at a desk so that gentle physical activity is a nice change. I work at home and even when I had a job it was in a university so I had flexible hours, hence I’ve always been able to pop into the kitchen and check on stuff over the course of the day. The transformations that go on in the kitchen intrigue me. And I like the taste of my food better than most of what I can get out. Besides after years at it, I have a whole raft of strategies for getting good food on the table without spending an inordinate amount of time on it.
But moral virtue? I don’t see it. And I think the time cooking takes is vastly underestimated. The “stand facing the stove” bit is just the tip of the iceberg. There’s the shopping, the unpacking, the ghastly thought every morning “What shall we have for dinner today?” the cleaning up, the keeping of the lists for the next bout of shopping, the impossibility of getting everything in one shop, the fact that you always forget something or run out of something.
My suspicion is that everyone who cooks for a household (and by that I mean the person who has responsibility for making sure there is food to put on the table, not just the person who chops and stirs) has a computer running at the back of their head all the time constantly pinging away on the food situation.
Nor is home cooked food necessarily healthier, safer, better tasting, and much cheaper. Even the author adds “if done thoughtfully” and of course “if done thoughtfully” gets us right back to that pinging computer.
Getting meals mechanized seems to me the great challenge of the twentieth and twenty first century, parallel to the blessed industrialization of food processing in the nineteenth. It seems to me specially true now that households in the US are smaller, hence more people having to worry about cooking. And that standards have risen and that diners expect variety. More of it not less, I say. Yes, cooking should become like sewing now is. A hobby you can engage in if you enjoy it but one that you choose.
And that will eventually lead back to the servant question that I find so interesting.
Nice post. I think vegetarian cooking is easier relatively. But all the things you point out are valid as well.
THANK YOU!
Rachel, I bristled and screamed when I read that piece yesterday. There seems to be so much that he has left out as he indulges in uninformed nostalgia for the good old days as people do who were not there and only have an image of how they wish it had been but probably was NOT except in the movies. One example is that his 240 minutes probably was to feed 6>10 people. Now 30 minutes often only feeds one person and, as you point out, that is only stove time.
Thank you for writing these words – they are really most excellent food for thought. :)
Thanks all of you. And lovely to have you commenting Karen.
Although I think the article was clumsy and his argument too unfocused, I have to disagree with you, Rachel.
I am the purchasing agent, cleaning, prep person, cook, menu planner and cleaner for our household. And maybe my computer is pinging all day, but it’s pinging about the need to change the sheets, clean the cat litter, pay the tax bill….it’s just a part of the day and gets built into the daily program. I don’t spend any more than 30 minutes making meals (on average) and I think the effort involved in making meals is over stated. The marketing strategy of screaming ‘quick’ or ‘easy’ has led people to think that cooking must be hard or time consuming and that simply isn’t always the case.
Practice gives you strategies, no matter what you do. I probably chop quicker than most because I’ve done a lot of it.
So, I do agree with Paul Roberts that most people would benefit from a little more contact with the raw ingredients that go into their food. But, I am also grateful for all that industrialized food production has done for all of us.
Great Judith, nothing better than a friendly disagreement to clarify matters. So let me have another go at this. I agree that it’s possible to put a meal on the table in 30 minutes, especially if like you (or me) you have years of experience, are cooking for two with the occasional guests, everyone gets their other meals themselves from the fridge, and if you are at home all day to just trot by and give a stir to the pot.
But supposing you count in list making, shopping, stowing the shopping, making breakfast for the kids, making a packed lunch or home lunch for one or more of the family, cup cakes to send to school, sorting that potential slough the fridge, washing up, and doing ancillary things like contributing to neighborhood pot lucks or office parties, or making basics to have on hand. I like to make my own bread because bolillos don’t do for all my needs, yogurt, agua fresca, proper salsas not pico de gallo, various preserves, and my husband would die without a pie, cake, cookies or homemade ice cream constantly on hand. I’m nuts, I know, but I’m picky and I enjoy kitchen work. And others freeze garden produce or stock large freezers and so on.
Leaving aside the last set, these tasks are I would have thought were common in American or European or Australian homes. And I’ve never managed to get them down to 3-1/2 hours a week.
I’m also not sure how many raw ingredients except for veg one comes in contact with if the kitchen is primarily an assembly line for processed ingredients, but I’ve gone on long enough already.
If you have time, I’d love to hear your reply.
Ciao Rachel. I had to scroll around to find this…so sorry for the delay in replying. We just got back to Italy, and it’s been a hectic time.
OK.
I agree that getting a week’s worth of food shopping, cooking, cleaning, etc. down to less than 3 1/2hours would be impossible. I’m guessing that in NY it was probably 5-7 hours and here in Italy, at least double that. So, I’m looking at roughly 14 hours in the kitchen per week. I also bake my own bread, make the pasta etc. and my Italian neighbors think I’m insane.
But the gratification, satisfaction, enjoyment (mine and my dining friends) must be adequate payback for that effort or I suppose I still wouldn’t be doing it.
Going back to the original article, isn’t that the point he was trying to make? That there are intangible pleasures and rewards for the time spent in the kitchen, and doing meal related tasks.
People come to me to learn some basic cooking skills, and they relax and laugh. It all ties in somehow with those who watch cooking shows for pleasure, and those who hang out in the kitchen because they want to be near the action. It’s primal.
What else do you do during the course of the day that gives you and others so much pleasure? i’m asking myself the same question at this moment. And being a completely committed hedonist, I’m very fond of pleasure….and a good discussion!
My mother spent hours and hours and hours in the kitchen trying to sustain the kind of cooking from the type of household that she was born into. Yes, she had servants as a child, lots of them responsible for a whole bunch of stuff.
I simply cannot reproduce this kind of cooking in my home kitchen for my household. It’s too much work and my children are too small to eat enough to make it worthwhile and they also crave variety.
I’ve cooked professionally and have taught cooking classes (Asian and Mediterranean cuisines). In my experience generally, people find it relaxing and fun when they have the option of doing of cooking.
I don’t have servants at home. Every morning I wake up, prepare breakfast for the kids, pack school lunches including what’s a called a “warm up” dish for reheating at school, when they come home from school it’s snack time (prepare and clean up), then dinner time (I did various parts of the shopping throughout the week or day), then clean up, etc.. After that homework and nightly bath, laundry for cleans clothes for school, and so on. The domestic grind continues.
I live in a big, technological advanced city in a decent part of town with a range of affordable goods and services. I have access to a huge range of ingredients from lots of stores all within a 10 minute drive, some within walking distance.
I work fast, have professional experience, etc…
But it’s still work. It’s fun when I have the time to spend the day doing it, otherwise, it’s another part of life for sustenance.
I also work full time. Even if I wanted to spend a lot of time in the kitchen I just don’t have the time.
Besides working and cooking, I also like to exercise, play sports, go swimming, ride my bike…
Summer is almost here and I’m thinking of those weeks between summer school and regular school when my children will be home with me all day.
Typical day with the kids at home (times include prep, plating, serving and clean-up, but does not factor in shopping time) :
Breakfast: 30-60 minutes.
Lunch: 45-60 minutes
Dinner: at least 60 minutes, sometimes 2-3 hours if I’m making everything from scratch or making extra for freezing.
Then, there are the snacks…
That’s a minimum of 3 hours a day, 21 hours per week. And that’s with lots of modern conveniences, in terms of technology, access to ingredients, storage, etc…
Ciao Ji.
I completely understand what you are saying. I also worked insane hours, wanted to get the gym, spend time with my family etc. I understand that, but what or how are your proposing to feed your family? What can you do to lessen your burden? What compromises will you make?
Life is high ideals and plans that run smack into reality: my husband is hungry and I need to feed him.
It’s a conundrum and a balancing act, every single day, isn’t it?
Yup, balancing act every day. I make things that freeze well and portion them out. I take shortcuts and sometimes combine prepared or processed foods with items made from scratch.
I think the word “kitchen” should be used like the word “farm” with an adjective attached.
I have wonderful memories of cooking in a country French kitchen in the Beaujolais. But it’s all French food all the time (with some North African thrown in), the local agriculture combines small farms with larger industrialized farming, lots of family members around, friends to share with. I think this is the “slow life” that Americans dream about. I remember the first time I drove into a tiny bourgeois village where the Rhone and Burgundy meet, it took my breath away.
But I also remember in 1975 before South Korea was an industrialized country just how hard it was to cook. Many households didn’t have running water, some just had a pump in front or there was a neighborhood well, lighting a kitchen fire meant stoking a large piece of charcoal. There were few modern supermarkets. Families had to purchase enough rice to last them until the next harvest. This meant storage issues, as well the opportunity for lots of little bugs to grow, and so on. You could have a maid if you could spare a bowl of rice and meager portions of side dishes.
Now, South Korea is an industrialized country. And lots of women have been liberated from having servants, being a servant or living like one. Food production has been mechanized and most women buy at least several side dishes and staple sauces. Cooking now is a hobby for the middle class, who look at recipes in glossy magazines, shows have food celebrities to incorporate the latest ingredient or food fad.
Back to France, even rural France is quite varied. Some parts just aren’t as glorious as where the Rhone and Burgundy meet. I remember an old French friend from Normandy talking about his family farm and all the work it took for food to get from field to table. They didn’t just buy a pork chop, the killed the whole beast and chopped it up.
Lots of different kinds of kitchens supported or not supported by lifestyle, local economy, relative affluence of the family, etc…
A lot of this is contextual. I’ve taught cooking to poor, urban Americans who mostly ate out of boxes and cans. And had issues with obesity and misnourishment. If they learned how to compose dishes by combining fresh ingredients with processed ones, I can’t help but think they would have a healthier diet.
There’s a lot of really, really bad, cheap, processed crap. And there’s good processed stuff. I think that quite a bit of American writing about food is framed for an audience that got really tired of really bad processed stuff. The problem is that eventhough the audience is a niche one, often these things are written about in a meta sort of way.
We’re all provincial to one extent or another, I suppose.
Yes, kitchen with an adjective attached is a great idea. My growing up was a lot like yours Ji Young. Now it’s a lot like Judith’s. Lots of comments but never try writing a food blog with stomach flu. Bad mix. I’ll return when I can face the thought!
Oh, I just remembered. A long, long time ago I took a couple of American literature courses and we learned about Americanisms such as notions of “the other”, “wilderness myths”, “back to nature”, etc.. I think this at least explains a part of a particularly American way of framing nostalgia for rural life. There are a lot of other factors, but this explains a good bit of the tone in what I call “glamour food writing” or writing targeting “foodies”.