And there ’ s another lesson , too . Mark Twain once said , “ Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain .” And so it happened with me and cooking . As we crossed the one-year anniversary of the lockdown , my relationship to cooking has been transformed . The kitchen is no longer an arena of anxiety ; it has become a genuinely happy place . Cooking , my younger self would be baffled to learn , is now something I do to relax at the end of a long day .
O ne year into my cooking-in-quarantine experiment , the stack of Hello- Fresh recipe cards that I have completed is more than an inch thick . And with the confidence from all of those training hours , I have begun to attempt more ambitious recipes from the New York Times cooking database : corn and coconut soup , olive walnut pasta , broccoli with anchovies and garlic , cumin-baked pork chops , ginger-lime chicken .
Before embarking on this COVID cooking journey , I remember marveling at a friend who had instinct in the kitchen — a seemingly ingrained sense for what to make , how to make it and which ingredients to add or subtract to make the flavors of a particular dish pop . And , somehow , miraculously , I have begun to develop a cooking instinct of my own . In some cases , I ’ ve even veered off-recipe to try a few successful inventions , like sliced figs topped with goat cheese and a drizzle of honey and balsamic glaze .
It ’ s been tremendously satisfying to develop such a life skill . But it ’ s also proof of something bigger . For most of my life , I viewed my inability to cook as an immutable fact , as fixed as the color of my eyes . But this was fiction . With practice , with commitment , and , yes , with a few scary moments , I am now a Guy Who Cooks . Cooking showed me that narratives about ourselves don ’ t have to be permanent . >>
RHODE ISLAND MONTHLY l MAY 2021 115