fresh hot popcorn, :0) polaroid 660
one thing we learned living outside of the country was realizing that people who enjoy pleasure in their lives are a better contribution to those around them because they are at one with themselves.
but what you might not expect is coming home and seeing the things that you don’t want to keep around. like the way you eat, oh man. what you might not know about the region of south america we lived in is that the people are predominantly of italian heritage. pizza, pasta, milanesas dominated the cuisine, and it was tasty. (and so was all that glorious meat, born and bred and eaten as nature intended, sigh!) when i went to italy at the height of summer and felt the rustic flavor of a tuscan bread soup melting sensuously on my tongue, it was like i had popped new taste buds. i really don’t know if words will describe that bowl of soup, but it was unforgettable! made with the ingredients found in a small radius of the villa we stayed at, it’s ingredients were never written down. that same trip, we would come back from painting in the sun all day and we took literally three or four hours to dine. (uruguayans and argentines know this pace as their own.) and during the break between a course, our group strolled outside to watch the sun dip behind the cypress trees…which was our cue to come in by the candlelight and have more. fact: italians = healthy, enviable relationship with their food. no wonder the slow food movement began in italy. they just get it.
i really like the optimism to be found in the “slow food” movement. the ideas seem intuitive and easy to grasp, and once hearing them i just don’t want to let go. so often causes worth fighting for focus so much on other people’s faults and what is wrong with society that negativity clouds whatever good might be trying to float to the top. and that easily turns me off. but how can loving a heirloom tomato be bad? and how did we get to this point anyway? where did food, in it’s natural state, become a new fangled thing? it’s all in our culture, but i don’t want the focus there. i just like the artistry involved, even as a little girl i would ask permission to bake a batch of cookies with the same eagerness one might ask for her first tube of mascara. mmm, always loved cooking. arranging and having a gorgeous presentation of home cooked meals is a labor of love i give to my boys every single day. i’ve always felt that if i didn’t care so much for the fine arts i would have gone to culinary school. (setup: audrey hepburn as sabrina fairchild in paris. 1, 2, 3…crack! new egg!) but i guess the culinary arts, well, that is still an art, huh?
sometimes it’s hard to find people as deeply interested in the arts, maybe it’s always been that way for me. so i find that food is an immediate bridge that quickly joins people who would otherwise have no connections. last week i blogged about how fashion mattered because everyone has to get up in the morning and get dressed…but that doesn’t mean that everyone cares about what they throw on. do you think that the same is true about what everyone puts in their body? everyone eats, and unlike an outfit, that eating occurs a few times in a day, so it would seem that more care and thought would go into such an occurrence.
like anything worth doing, relearning my relationship with food takes time. especially living in the city, where extra efforts will need to be made. there is a lot of undoing to take place, years of modern conveniences and fast-food prove it to be a challenge, but i’m determined that good, pleasurable dining can be simple. i’m one of many in a delicious revolution, and i find it best to refer to books, because inside their covers is usually where i find inspiration. hopefully you may find something wonderful from them too. and if this strikes a chord with you, please mention your sources too. my appetite for this topic is ferocious. and while i suspect this won’t by the last you’ll hear about it, i thought this next week i’d share some of my favorite and inexpensive beauty secrets with you. now onto the list…
the art of simple food by alice waters
slow food nation by carlo petrini
perfection salad & something in the oven by laura shapiro
super natural cooking by heidi swanson
moosewood restaurant new classics
mindless eating by brian wansink
As you probably know, I´m 100% with you on this one. It does take extra work sometimes, but good honest food brings so much joy that the work pays off, and I´m sure our bodies thank us for keeping away quite a few chemicals that way.
Thanks for the book recommendations. I just ordered an Alice Waters book recently, and then a book by Barbara Kafka called Vegetable Love which looks very promising. I think my mom has the slow food book somewhere, I need to get hold of it.
On that line, there´s also a book called In Praise of Slowness by Carl Honoré which you might like http://www.amazon.com/Praise-Slowness-Challenging-Cult-Speed/dp/B000GH2YHO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203829867&sr=8-1
And I just found a recipe I´m gonna try very soon and sounds like your style too http://www.thekitchn.com/thekitchn/rice-grains/party-recipe-spicy-ovenroasted-chickpeas-043595
Phew, that was a long comment!
slow food nation is a great book!
I’m loving those posts .
The last one makes my think about the book by
Alice Steinbach – Educating Alice where Alice
goes on a European journey of self-discovery
and tries things like gardening in Provence,flower arranging in Kyoto,cooking in Paris .Steinbach had opened the door to a new way of living, she found herself unwilling to return to her old routine ..
great post jenny. i’m really enjoying your thoughts on this topic.
thank you for all those links, jenny!
milanesas, empanadas, pasta, tartas…i have to say that i am still cooking all of those now. but i try very hard [because sometimes it can get very expensive too] to buy the best ingredients for them.
i hope you are having a beautiful sunday.
You’re really making me thing about my relationship to food lately. Thank you’s for that.
thank you for the wonderful suggestions everyone – it’s like that strange thing where you are wearing an unusual color, yet all day you can’t help but notice it everywhere… there’s a lot i’m finding just this weekend on all this. and this is a conversation that i will love to continue.
I’ve been thoroughly enjoying your posts on food/nutrition/emotion recently, and am currently reading and using the Alice Waters book myself. I’m so happy not only to find lovely bits on jewelry here (which first drew me to your blog) but also interesting ideas on other topics I’m concerned about. Thanks!
this all sounds so wonderful jenny, and you took me there with your writing. i was once in italy and so remember a particular meal – where new taste buds were made because of the wonderful flavour as something so simple as a tomato sauce (i have never tasted that ever again)…
life here in north america is a little unbalanced this tells me.
I think I have every Moosewood cookbook published ~ they are brilliant. I have been reading a lot lately about the slow food movement, and am really happy to see it beginning to take hold in the US.
And ~ I am so happy to see you back blogging!