I’ve experimented around the kitchen to a greater extent than ever. Different leaves, stems, roots, spices, and even banana peels have found their way into my whimsical dishes. I’ve ventured further into the realm of presentation with particular slicing and preprocessing of ingredients.
All of this takes time. Yet at present, it’s time I find worthy of the deed.
Thorough food preparation can be an incredibly enticing activity if, I emphasize, handled mindfully, meditatively, one gradual motion at a time.
Over the last year virtually all my meals have already tasted exceptionally well. With the restricted eating window and the appetite quiet authentic, the eating experience grows thrice as rewarding.
But never has a meal felt as rewarding as presently, with the additional touch, with the increased variety, with the exercise of full control behind every session.
In fact, while traditionally (ill-)disposed to a parallel session of reading, I’ve now often felt at odds to divide the attention. To do both is to either sacrifice the appreciation behind the meal, or, in the case of the reading, to forego the rhetorical pleasantries.
Lately I’ve grown challenged, if not entirely dyslexic (as I extend in certain tumultuous moments) to adequately consume reading material at short of 100% focused attention. Or perhaps it’s the nature behind the antiquated language of mostly everything I read.
But to resume the culinary subject, it has been a trend of notably increased time investment in spirit of marginal appreciation. Does the benefit justify the cost? It feels so at present. But plainly carried by the moment, I haven’t much analyzed the metric.
However, come again a time of dropped enthusiasm or greater time constraint, adjustments are aplenty to optimize the matter in spirit of the good old 80-20, of the minimal effort towards maximal yield:
Ingredients need not necessarily be sliced. Many you can cook whole.
On that topic, you definitely need not micro-slice garlic or onions for every bloody preparation.
Many ceremonies and ingredients you can eliminate yet still retain 80% of the taste.
* I’ve found that ‘soup’ of nothing but beets (authentic, not canned) renders 70% of the taste behind Borscht. And mixing that 5-10 minute boiling procedure with a chicken ‘soup’ of nothing but onions and chicken (another 30 minutes in parallel), renders about 80% of the taste, compared to a 1.5-2 hour journey behind a complete Slavic borscht. However, I can imagine certain chefs to hang me by the neck for such a proposition.
Dishes can be more seamlessly roasted/boiled rather than sautéed.
For the truly kitchen dyslexic, mostly everything has a way of being tossed inside the microwave and come out sort of edible.
Slow-cooker contraptions enable you to simply leave ingredients to process slowly overnight.
Likewise, you can leverage electrical ovens, rice cookers, garlic squeezers, juicers, specialized graters, slicers, and various other gastronomic chicanery.
Not my style, as I prefer the minimal amount of the simplest of tools, but options exist.
Many more vegetables can be consumed raw, peel intact (if cleansed) than people realize. However, the nutritional value tends to often vary between the raw and cooked forms, and not necessarily in any precise direction.
I mention nothing of canned alternatives to dishes otherwise easily and inexpensively prepared. I deplore these, although they’re useful on forest hikes.
And as far as what I consider the essential kitchen equipment?
A comfortable, reasonably sharpened knife makes all the difference. You can, in fact, use one such knife, not too large and not too small, to peel, slice, dice, stir and even eat; for effectively everything.
Be dexterious with this knife and become a kitchen ninja. I’m finding that the cooking efficiency, parallel processes sufficiently in place, resort mostly to your wielding of the knife.
Mostly everything else lends to much flexibility. Boil anything, including hot water and coffee, in whatever sufficiently sized pot. Cook, sauté and even toast bread in any non-stick pan. Combine ingredients to economize space and time.
Kitchen labor can become a fairly streamlined ceremony and yet produce absolutely delicios, varied and even exotic yield.
Questions, comments? Connect.