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Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Home Cooking


I didn't start out loving to cook. I didn't start out noticing the many different cuisines in the world. 
I started out hungry.

For the first seventeen years, I was just plain hungry all the time.
Then, I became hungry for food that tasted like home.
Finally, food that nourished, felt like home, and fulfilled more than one hunger.

I'm in a good place at this time, exposed to many cuisines; able to download and learn how to cook many different dishes; rich enough to travel and taste authentic foods in their  native states.
Yet, I feel that most of us are just getting acquainted with local, sustainable food and its value.

During a marathon cooking session with my daughter in law and her sisters a couple of years ago, women in the kitchen, each making sure that the food we prepared could be eaten by all of our loved ones, those with stomach problems, those with heart issues, those with tastes that hadn't changed since childhood. On this day, if I can decipher the food in front of us, there was an eggplant parmigiana, accompanied by an eggplant without parmigiana for the relative who couldn't eat cheese, accompanied by a vegetable strudel for those folks that couldn't eat tomatoes or cheese or eggplant. Not on display was a roast, for those of us who still crave meat and potatoes. My cooking companions were most surprised not by the fact that I could change a dish to accommodate a special diet, but by the fact that an older cook like me still makes a backward time schedule, so everything gets on the table close to the same time.

 Ah, the life of the cook!

When I was a child, and until I moved to the United States, I had not tasted any other food outside of my house without a bit of skepticism. I remember the spaghetti e vongole in Naples, where my big brother and I visited often the last few years before my emigration. The American Consulate was studying my application and finding one thing or another was amiss every time we visited. The spaghetti was the best tasting thing I had ever eaten, and consoled us after each visit that was not successful.

When I told my mother how good the food was in Naples,  she dismissed the thought entirely. "It's good because you didn't have to do any work to get it to the table!"

Not really, I thought then.

Something is either good or not, and our spaghetti at home was made the way my father liked it, without seafood. He liked seafood fresh, he kept saying, and nothing else. If you are going to eat something that has been gathered the day before, has traveled miles, has sat around, even on ice, for hours before it was bought or delivered to the cook, that something had lost its very soul.

I stored that in my future drawers, for those times when I would be responsible for my own food, and my own preparation of such food.

Lately, I don't even attempt to order seafood inland. Not that I don't understand the fact that most fish is caught and iced and transported to shore and sold and shipped in refrigerated or frozen containers until they reach their destination. If you have ever tasted fresh seafood, from a fisherman that has caught and filleted that fish, you know the difference. You will not ask for your favorite; you will ask for what was caught that day.

Freshly caught trumps everything else.

20 comments:

joeh said...

It is not easy to find fresh, but you are spot on. On our fishing trip to Costa Rica, we brought a 25 lb sea bass caught that day to a restaurant and they prepared it for us...fresh is extra good.

Vagabonde said...

I really enjoyed reading that post. That is what I like about blogging; we can read so many different views of the way people were raised, or ate, or whatever else. I love Italian cooking – the way it is cooked in Italy as I find that they often add sugar to dishes here, so I know it was not hard for you to enjoy your cuisine.

I was never hungry when I was a young child and meals were often a torture (wish I had this problem now …) My father being Armenian, we ate Armenian dishes (like Lebanese and Turkish cuisines.) Of course my mom being from Paris we ate French food mostly. But then we also had household help (you did not have to be that rich to have help.) In the kitchen we had women from Spain and also Portugal and they cooked their own way – I liked it all. Then we also went to many restaurants in Paris (as my mother did not like to be in the kitchen) – my favorites were the North African ones where they served real couscous with lamb, but I also liked the Russian ones. Here in the US, for my daughters I cooked all type of cuisines from the time they were babies and they ate what was on their plates (had a special gadget to grind food so I never bought baby jars) – never had to cook something special just for them. I was so surprised when arriving in the US to see “children menu” in restaurants. I had never seen these in Paris while growing up and would order from the adult menu, plus the children menu here have very little to offer (chicken pieces, hamburgers, hot dogs, macaroni n cheese...) – I won’t ever order from it for the grand kids. (When we took our grandson to New Orleans for a week, at 6 years old, he ate étouffée, gumbo, red bean and rice and jambalaya.)

Cheryl Cato said...

Very nice... your kitchen is terrific! One of the best seafood dishes was a large fish, fresh caught and cooked in rock salt (head to tail). The fish was filleted and served at the table. The water was a stones throw away on the Costa del Sol, Spain in 1978. I don't think I'll ever forget the experience!

Vagabonde said...

I really enjoyed reading that post. That is what I like about blogging; we can read so many different views of the way people were raised, or ate, or whatever else. I love Italian cooking and I am sure yours growing up must have been very tasty. As you say, fresh food and local food is indeed much better.

Rian said...

I was taught the same thing... but from my mom in New Orleans... "only use or eat fresh seafood". And I too love to cook. Cooking slowly and enjoying the process is very comforting.

Barbara said...

Hi Rosaria, I just popped over from Tom's blog and this post was what I needed to hear today. I got some not so great medical news yesterday and I've been thinking about how I need to eat better. I don't like to cook but I'm going to need to find the love for it. I like how you said you didn't always love it and now I'm going to search for ways to embrace it.

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Rosaria .. I was lucky being brought up on homegrown fruit and veg, having chickens and pigs (early on) ... then always buying locally - the fishman called on his rounds ... and we were often by the sea in Cornwall.

I wish we could get the youngsters to learn to cook and appreciate why it's essential to use fresh (even if not quite fresh) rather than bought meals ..

Cheers and good luck to all on eating healthily .. Hilary

Helen said...

The finest fish I ever tasted was a rainbow trout ~ caught, cleaned, filleted by my son Chris years ago at a hatchery near my mother's home in the Ozark foothills of Missouri. I enjoy cooking and make every attempt to use the freshest ingredients possible, even more so since Carl's diabetes diagnosis in August 2014. Happy weekend to you and Ken!

JeannetteLS said...

Bluefish fresh caught of Cape Cod, the way my aunt used to cook it! I have found I DO cook more again, even though it is usually just for me... with fresh veggies when they are in season here, and organic animal proteins... The process has meaning I think. Loved this post--but, then, that's nothing new, is it!

Shadow said...

If you love to cook, your food tastes good. You speak with love *smiles*

yaya said...

One of the best trout dishes I ever had was prepared by my Brother who caught it fresh and grilled it for us...oh my, so yummy. I love to cook and learned much from my Mom, especially Greek cuisine. But I have to admit I've learned a lot from TV and internet and pushed myself to learn how to use fresh herbs and veggies whenever possible. I love Farmer's Markets for that reason. Getting fresh seafood here is hard except for perch or walleye. Anyway, I'm betting your table could rival any great restaurant!

the walking man said...

Call me pedestrian Rosaria, give me grilled cheese with a bit of tomato and lunch meat and I am sustained for the day. Best seafood--right off the docks of New Bedford MA.

Tabor said...

I always try to eat local. In Europe the restaurant menus change with the season and what is in abundance, etc. In the USA we eat was we like and do not think about freshness or how far it traveled...etc. And then when we eat fresh we are surprised about how good food tastes.

Hilary said...

That's so true about fresh being best. The summers that I fished for fresh walleye offered all the proof I need for that. Your meals look scrumptious. Adopt me, please?

Rhodesia said...

Oh I could not agree more, fresh is best. We grow most of our own veggies and they taste so much better than bought ones. I used to love cooking, but I have got bored with it. If I am alone I just eat raw veggie from the garden but of course the man of the house wants a cooked meal. Thankfully he has taken some cooking classes and cooks at least twice a week now :-) Hope you are well Diane

A Cuban In London said...

I loved this post so much. I fell in love with cooking fifteen years ago and have not looked back. I would like to do more of it, though. Still my wife and now my daughter are the ones who still do most of the cooking.

Greetings from London.

troutbirder said...

Indeed when it's fresh. So we love our caught daily at our favorite fish market in Homosassa Florida during our winter stays. Yummy!

Elephant's Child said...

My father fished for trout. We followed him along the river banks with a frypan. When he caught (if he caught) was when we ate. And no fish I have had since tastes that good...

Starting Over, Accepting Changes - Maybe said...

I used to cook because I had to, now I cook because I like to. Unfortunately, my husband does not like the fuss and muss, so we eat out a lot.

Maggie May said...

I wish I was a really good cook...... I get by but don't enjoy cooking, only eating!!!! That's a different story!
Maggie x