Anyone Hungry?

Originally posted November 8th 2023

As many issues as I have with the internet, I have to give it credit for getting me into cooking. I grew up with both parents working full time, everyone got home at different times, we only ate together on holidays and birthdays or when dining out. Home cooked meals were rare and not something I found enjoyable. I was a very, very picky eater (I still am, but getting significantly better), so a meal I did not have 100% control over was incredibly stressful. Dinner was usually plain pasta with butter or rice with spicy tofu. I don’t remember eating anything else besides maybe cereal for dinner up until I moved to Ireland at 17.

I’ve been very lucky that from 17 until last year, I tended to live with very good cooks. People who have a sense for seasonings and could look in a cupboard and put together a full meal from what to me seemed like nothing. Funnily, I lived with a professional chef and he cooked the least of my roommates, being exhausted from a day in a boiling kitchen. The deal was I did the dishes. I am a dish cleaning master. On occasion someone would show me something, like how to properly use a knife from the chef friend, or how to whip up a carbonara from my cousin. Another friend always made eggplant curry, another a good steak, jerk seasoning on a portobello mushroom. Little things I picked up but never utilised until the last year.

Once I moved to Spain, in a not rural but far enough away that takeaway was not an option, I realised I needed to start learning. Starting out with chicken and rice, figuring out spices, onion and garlic powder becoming my best friends. Spicy and salty was the way because I smoked like a chimney at the time so my taste buds had zero nuance.

When I moved to America a year ago suddenly my health became a huge factor in my anxiety. So to combat it in a healthy way, I decided to quit drinking for 6 months, quit smoking and lastly, start cooking more than chicken and rice. At first I watched youtube videos but they always felt dragged out and the food variety was never great because I don’t like steak or BBQs which for some reason was a primary recommendation on my feed. I didn’t know where to start so how could I seek out better food? I got a bunch of cookbooks and those have helped significantly, Colu Cooks is fabulous, I go back to it the most. Instagram has been really helpful (a weird sentence to write). I have a whole folder of recipe videos that I’ve followed several of. I am now reaching a point where I can look into my fridge without a plan and make something work. You’d be surprised how easy cooking becomes if you have a sack of potatoes and red onions in the fridge at all times. It really all is garlic and onions then whatever else on top.

I’ve recently become obsessed with sweet potatoes. I roast them in the oven with rosemary and serve it with some Greek marinated chicken (recipe here). Been frying up tofu. Garlic and spinach disappear in the pan and into my stomach. I’ve been keeping it incredibly simple. Need to still make the transition from white rice to brown, wanting to make some shiitake dashi to cook it in.

I know soup season is a bit of a meme, but I am excited. I have an instant pot that my sister found for free and I’m ready to make loads of broth and slow cooked meals. Everything I cook I think of ways to make it vegetarian or vegan if they’re not already. There’s a recipe for butter chicken (I’m obsessed with it, I mentioned it in a previous substack but it’s so so good and easy, it’s on instagram here) that could easily be made veggie, but I want to take it a step future and experiment making it vegan. I’m starting to make that leap into trusting my taste (and my gut). I’ve learned chickpeas go with anything, a little feta turns an okay salad into a winner and that a good mustard for dressing is vital. I recently googled “how to add some pizzazz to a turkey sandwich” (the general consensus seems to be pickled peppers or pickled red onions, which seems obvious).

Now I want to cook all the time, I want to make everyone a really good meal. Give me all your dietary restrictions and I’m going to have so much fun making you something delicious. No more jarred pesto! (well, we’re gonna finish the jars in the cupboard first, obviously). Now when I go to the grocery and see all the canned soups, I think how much nicer they’d be homemade, how much more enjoyable making things myself is. A new joy of eating at a restaurant is now wondering how I can make it myself.

A big new challenge is bread. I’m really, really bad at making bread. After several failed sourdough loafs I think my starter has died, possibly ratioed it wrong when feeding. I want to make a mean Irish soda bread that I don’t have to make from the pre-packaged bag. I want to learn how to make all the flatbreads. I need to have more patience for it. Baking being far less forgiving than cooking. But I’ll learn.

I’m grateful for once, that the instagram algorithm has shown me so many great recipes I’ve come to love. At least with short form, it cuts out the fat and I only see what I need to. Unless you’re on the weird side of the internet with the horny chefs. That’s too far gone for me but I would also love to talk to someone about the weird ass horny chefs on tiktok. The sexualisation of the body and food, gender, labour and love, so many essays are going to be written about these people if they haven’t been already. But that’s a whole other conversation.

My instagram feed has primarily become food related (and cat videos). Lots of lentils and chickpeas, so so many soups, ways to put your scraps to good use. Broccoli reigns supreme. There’s discourse about rhubarb (it’s pretty but doesn’t taste good is the argument, so it shows up in lots of recipes when it doesn’t have to be there). There’s some lovely videos of people showing how their immigrant parents used local ingredients to make versions of dishes from back home. Debates over the idea of “authentic” and “traditional”. I suppose I love anything that makes me think about the origins of practice and ethics. Which is everything. But for now it’s cooking.

One of my greatest joys in cooking was quite recently. My sister had a bad day at work and I asked if I could make anything to make her feel better. Usually my sister is incredibly indecisive when it comes to picking what to eat, I expected her to say “whatever” and there’d be a back and forth until we landed on something. But instead she texted “Is curry possible?”, because I’d been on a roll making butter chicken every week for like 3 weeks, I felt a sense of joy I’d never felt. She wanted something I make! Specifically! We’re both obsessed. It’s basically tomato and onion soup with spices so it’s hard to feel guilty about eating it so often. It’s really exciting being able to at the end of a bad day, make my sister smile with some good food. (I promise, after this I will never mention butter chicken again, but also, there’s hardly any butter in the recipe so I don’t know why it’s called that, you could even leave it out, then again I might not be using the most traditional recipe).

I’ve been looking at cooking classes in my area but unfortunately it’s a bit bare. I’d like to do some with my sister, get a bit more well rounded knowledge of how to pair sides and mains, when to add lemon, etc. Or maybe I’ll just keep scrolling reels and hope for the best.

It’s gotten cold so the tea drawer is back in action. I can’t seem to find my favourite tea anywhere, Pukka vanilla chai, no stores have it in stock. So I’ve been searching for a replacement. For a while I used the David Rio Tiger Mix but like my particular flavour of Pukka, I could only get it off amazon, so I stopped. I was gifted a box of teabags of the most bitter chai I’ve ever had and I believe it was chai in the literal sense (regular black tea) rather than masala chai. Now I’m testing out Rishi Tea, it has a mild flavour but it is nice. I still miss my Vanilla chai though, I think I might have to suck it up and make it myself.

Every evening, around 5pm, an ice cream truck drives by the apartment, music blasting. I wonder who is buying ice cream when it’s on average 10 degrees out during the day. But I also find myself with a sweet tooth, and the idea of eating an ice lollie in the cold for some reason appeals to me. It’s like drinking a hot tea in summer, trying to balance the outside with the inside. American sweets, although not very nice, are addictive. I worry when I find myself craving a packet of skittles or a whole bar of chocolate. It’s not exactly shame, it’s more so because American food makes me very nervous. But I can also have a bar of milka in the fridge for over a week without thinking about it, so I don’t know. I’m not used to craving sweets, but maybe I should take the opportunity to make some myself, beyond my usual go tos. I love making carrot cake, banana bread and lemon crinkle cookies. So those are likely to start making more appearances, dust off the stand mixer. I’d love to get good at pastry, if I could make my own croissants I think I’d be the happiest girl in the world. But I’m pretty sure pastry is harder than bread, so I should get better at that first. Or screw it, maybe I’d enjoy making pastry more so I’d be better at it anyways.

My sister and I recently found a fancy grocery shop near out flat. It’s got both a cheese monger and a butcher, organic wines, a section of tinned fish (which is the trendy food rn, I guess?), lots of well designed labels that tell you that if you have this product, you’ll become a put together person. So we got some things, dried mango, the Rishi tea, organic flour, a couple scallion tumeric sausages, stir fry sauce that I later realised I can’t eat because of oyster sauce, Nunez de Prado olive oil and a big chunk of comte. While we waited to order cheese I think I inspired the two girls ahead of us to order comte too, as I was debating out loud whether to get it or try a new one. We were able to have a piece before deciding, it was as is usual with comte, quite mild at first but then the flavour really kicked in in the after taste. It might be the strongest comte I’ve ever had, the taste not leaving my mouth for quite some time. It almost coats the throat, but not in a greasy way, more like a perfume. It’s delicious! (I’ve taken a quick break from writing to go grab some from the fridge and I can report it’s still good). Grabbed sourdough from the market just outside the park and why wont Americans make their sourdough sour dammit! But apparently, California has the best sourdough, so I want to test that out in a couple weeks. But our new local market is good, loads of fresh veg, a couple bread stands, a honey stand. Everything we need.

On Sunday night I went with my siblings and sister in law to a fancy pizza restaurant. We had to sit outside which was alright until the wind kicked in. But we were jolly to be out and about together, chowing down on a margarita, a juno (broccoli rabe, potatoes, provola, ricotta salata) and a pops (lots of onions, guanciale and pecorino). We finished dinner with a flourless chocolate cake which I’d never had before, it’s somewhere between cake and fudge. Milder in flavour than a regular cake which I liked. After dinner, feeling brave, I told my sister in law that I’m at a place mentally where if I was invited for dinner at theirs I would go which delighted everyone. I am realising more and more the need to push myself. That there will never be a point of 100% no anxiety, that I need to do things because I want to and not give up because anxiety wants me to stay in place. Within 30 minutes of leaving I’d been invited to theirs for dinner next month. So I’m excited and my sister said it should be a potluck so I can bring something. Which I’m quite excited to do, because the idea of cooking for others brings me great joy, and also I’m a huge show off.

I sat in a café by myself and journaled for the first time in years. I only really realised that during my time sat down, the radio playing. I was lucky too, getting a table just before a rush started. In 2019, I remember I would sit in Burley-Fisher in the morning before my shift as a stockroom manager started at 11am in Shoreditch, then sometimes after my shift ended, I’d head back to Burley-Fisher to work the bar for an event. Once Burley-Fisher became my only job, I stopped journaling there. Once March 2020 came around, I stopped journaling all together. Sometimes I’d sit at the Bread Station in London Fields, but usually I’d just draw. I went from religiously journaling at 18 up until 25, then poof, it was gone. I tried over and over again to get back into it. But I think I stopped because it made me sad. There was nothing to talk about but how rubbish I felt, so I preferred not to talk about it at all.

But last night I decided, since my Substack had sort of become a stand-in for journaling, to give it another go. I took out a composition note book, nothing fancy like a moleskin, and wrote about the banal. Then I packed a bag, set aside clothes for the day and decided I’d go to the café. This morning I doubted that plan, having forgotten to set my alarm so I woke up at 8:30 instead of 7, which I’d been doing for the last week or so to fix my sleep schedule. But I did my morning pastel drawing, had a cup of coffee with my sister before she headed to work, did some edits. Then at 10 I got off my arse, got dressed and headed to the café. Ate a not very impressive croissant and a latte. My anxiety for the most part was mild, an old feeling I knew well, knew it couldn’t hurt me. Then a big wave, begging for me to pack up my things and go home. I simply told myself it’ll pass. Kept writing. My hand was shaky but I pressed my right index finger into my wrist and it stopped the shaking. Wrote a couple pages. My cursive making it impossible for someone to read what I was writing.

I was thinking that having writers journals published is a curse on everyone. Because now there in an audience whenever I write. I decided to focus on things so banal that no one would ever consider publishing my journals once I’m dead (there’s a lot of them, and I don’t think there will ever be a day where someone thinks they’re worth showing to the world, but there’s a voice that is an outsider, judging). I want this writing to again, be just for me. Because even though this substack is mainly for me, people do read it (and thank you for that), so when I write I consider the audience. I do the same in painting. I want to move into making work that is not intended for anyone. Perhaps I shouldn’t refer to it as work then.

Something I like about journaling is it reminds me how boring I am. I think we all get carried away with intense thoughts, thinking we’re terrible people, thinking we’re good people, etc, etc. The thoughts that stick out tend to be the most extreme. The nice part of writing down my thoughts is that they’re fairly inconsequential. It’s a mental check in, not the mental forcing its way out when things get rough (I believe this is what the kids call “mindfulness”). I’m hopeful I can keep up the habit.

Thank you for reading,

Enya xx

Recommended substacks and instagram pages:

danielsonwilliams_

Soup Season

sssssoupsssss

sssssaladsssss

Ethaney Lee

tenderherbs

eeeat

alexacooksme

alexacooksme

plantbasedrd (plant based recipes)

morocooks

Colu Henry