I was watching this TED Talk from Jamie Oliver (my main man...besides my husband, who is actually my main man) the other day, and it got me thinking about my own food journey.
Not too long ago, I, like many people, believed that "low fat," "fat free," "sugar-free," and other "add chemical taste here" products were the only and most correct way to eat. Fat-free sugar-free yogurt? Yes, please. Sugar-free candy? Sure! Splenda? Yep, because sugar is surely Satan's cousin. I was really only concerned with three areas on the nutrition label: calories, fat, and sugars. I didn't take any other nutrient into account except, most naively at that point, protein. Blissfully, I'd fill my grocery cart up with "healthy" yogurts, "healthy" protein bars, and other "healthy" chemical-laden atrocities that seemed, by all accounts, to be what every good, healthy, and satisfied person was supposed to eat, plus a few random fruits and veggies.
It really wasn't until a health crisis knocked me off my feet and literally made me reteach myself how to eat that I realized that the only way I felt good, healthy, and satisfied was if I ate...wait for it...food. Real food. Not processed, additive-filled junk. Real food.
It was a long journey, and by no means an easy one.
I'd grown up watching my mom cook in the kitchen. A contract attorney with three kids, a stressful job and a hefty volunteer schedule, my mom always made it a point to cook us dinner. Oftentimes, it was the only chance we'd have all day to talk with each other, since we always seemed to be running from appointment to appointment. Not every meal was a masterpiece--as none ever are for anyone--but she never made us feel like she didn't have the time or energy to cook us a hot meal. I only recently realized how amazing all this is, and I'll never forget it as long as I live. Thanks to Mom's example, I learned early on that the kitchen is an important place for a family.
I started my own cooking journey off with breads; when my mom and dad went to Husker football games, I'd stay home and bake bread literally all day, finding pride in wrists and forearms sore from kneading and hands caked with flecks of dried dough. Baking bread is a labor of love, and I really did love it.
But somewhere along the line, in all the hustle and bustle of life, I forgot how much I loved being in the kitchen, and traded handmade dough for prepackaged bricks of energy and sugar deceptively dubbed "protein bars" and the monstrosity of "45-calorie-a-slice bread."
That time is five years gone now, and I've come a long way.
I'm not going to launch into some soapbox speech about diet or health or whatnot, because my belief in real food comes mostly from the fact that real food tastes better and it makes me feel better. I've dived head-first back into the world of cooking because preparing foods that my family enjoys makes me happy and because learning about ingredients and preparing meals that respect the integrity of those ingredients means something to me.
That was a little soapbox-y, wasn't it? Sorry.
Anyway, what got me thinking about all of this was a review for Michael Pollan's new book, Cooked, that I read in a magazine recently. This book poses serious questions: Where along the line did Americans lose our love of cooking? Since when did cooking become less of a thing "everyone does" and more of a field relegated to celebrity chefs? And why do we seem to spend more time watching other people cook than cooking in our own kitchens?
I picked it up, and have just begun getting into it. So far, so good. Plus, it's gotten me thinking about my food journey. What's yours?
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