A couple of weeks ago, the question was posed to me by someone special: “[Jadon] what makes [cooking] so peaceful for you?”. I sat on this question for all of 10 minutes before cooking the featured bomb.com meal. Then I wrote out half this blog and then I had something to do which made me distracted and then I didn’t finish and then this blog just sat on my desktop and then I was cooking and then I was thinking about blogging… and well long story short, I finished it now. So here is my long-delayed answer for you Karissa (and to the rest of the 33 people who read my blogs):
I love cooking. I love it more than a lot of other things. I really like eating, but I may just enjoy cooking more. Seriously. I don’t know what is wrong with me, but it is just how I work. It wasn’t always this way. I used to be exceptionally picky. I ate pretty much only yellow-ish foods: cauliflower, corn, chicken nuggets, mac and cheese, buttered pasta (I am not kidding, I used to not add marinara sauce to pasta), grilled cheese, buttered quesadillas with almost no cheese (to be sure, if you make a plate of yellow food, I will definitely enjoy it a lot). Then I changed. I don’t know when it happened, but it did. I started to eat pretty much everything (except Jell-O, which I am certain God has already damned to Hell. It is not even a food. Come on, the stuff is nasty and it feels terrible in the mouth. Even yellow Jell-O is bad). Then I changed again. I went from microwaving my chicken nuggets to baking them (which if you haven’t made this change yet, do so and your life will change for the better). Then from following recipes to totally ignoring them. It has been a gradual change, but it has all been for the better.
If Saint Augustine’s moment of conversion happened when he went off into a garden alone, mine happened when I went off into a kitchen alone. The Vitamix called out to me from beyond the cabinet, “pull me out and blend me”. To which I answered with a step of faith and a bit of coffee and ice cream, a swirl of caramel, a dash of half-n-half, and a dusting of cocoa powder. I ran to my mom with this concoction and she too was having her moment of conversion. She had tasted a little bit beyond what I had. I knew God had called me to that moment. From then on I made the kitchen and Vitamix my one …
But seriously. Cooking is a part of who I am. When God made me, He must have thought that His chef was not adding enough chili powder and parsley to His meals—so He just figured that He would make me able to do that. When I cook, I just do what God made me to do—add a little more chili powder and parsley (I don’t think parsley really even has much flavor, but I will continue to add it anyway). I feel at home in the kitchen. I can pair weird combinations. I can match flavors. I can create new things. There are not really any rules. Yet there are so many rules, too. I can break rules as if there are not any. I can follow some if need be though. I can also make up others as if my name was Hammurabi, all because that is what I think cooking was meant to be.
So, the peace of it.
There is not always peace in cooking, I am not going to lie. The Tapatio burning in too hot of a pan and probably causing lung cancer, the oil sizzling and splashing all over the once clean stovetop, the garlic blackening in the bottom of your pan and ruining that subtle savory flavor you were developing—those are not peaceful. But the gentle slice of an avocado with a really sharp knife is peaceful. The brave combination of cinnamon and curry in your chicken marinade (also add some vinegar, garlic, thyme, rosemary, oil, salt, and pepper and take yourself to the Mediterranean tonight) does something deep inside. The masterful and perfect flip of an omelet—nothing can beat it.
I believe that this is a fallen world we live in. It is not restored. It is imperfect. Which logically means that cooking is fallen. Somewhere along the way Satan got his hands in the kitchen and screwed it all up for us. But we have a savior who not only redeems our souls, but our flavor palettes as well. If you don’t believe me then trust scripture: “behold, I am making all things new …. these words are trustworthy and true” and “behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, / and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind” (Rev 21:5, Is 65:17; italics my own). Behold. Cooking shall be made new and Jell-O shall not be remembered.
So my peace in cooking comes from letting Christ restore it into His Kingdom. I think Jesus loves to cook with me and He loves to redeem my Tapatio vapor asphyxiation. He likes chili powder and parsley. He also loves cold brew from hipster mason jars and sourdough sandwiches with yellow mustard.
If you need a little peace, then cook with the only One who has a restored kitchen.
If you need a little goodness, then cook with this recipe which is one made with the help of The Restorer of Kitchens.
COLD BREW & COLD CHEWS:
and Rhyming Titles for Recipes
Cold Brew Coffee:
-1 QT filtered Water
-1/4 Cup Rough grounds
-hipster mason jars
Sandwich:
-sourdough bread
-marinated chicken (see below)
-yellow mustard (this is no time for your fancy pineapple Dijon. If you want fancy, use fancy yellow mustard)
-butter
-iceberg lettuce
–homegrown tomatoes (random-thoughts-with-Lippincotts: are Roma tomatoes, romatoes?)
-homegrown romatoes
-feta cheese
Chicken Marinade:
-red wine vinegar (1 TBL per chicken breast)
-salt to taste
-pepper to taste
-parsley (duh) (1 tsp per chicken breast)
-chili powder (duh) (1 tsp per chicken breast)
-chicken (duh. Like really DUH)
-time <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbFoHuFQDu8>
Hipster Decorations for your Blog Photo:
-nectarine (but make sure you slice out ¼ of it so that you really get the proper atmosphere and color in your photo)
-carrot sticks (you cannot be found being unhealthy and eating the Nutter-Butters you actually are going to eat with this sandwich)
-Meade Co-Op knife (pretty much all of you are screwed with this part because you have no idea what Meade Co-Op is. But then again who actually eats their sandwiches with knives in them?)
-blue plates with hand painted swirls (to contrast the orange carrots and nectarine)
-wood grain table
For cold brew: add coffee to water. Let it sit in the fridge for 12 hours. Strain with a cloth or coffee filter. Pour only in mason jars. If not some hipster police guy with kale breath in too short of skinny jeans and Toms will slap you over the head with his muscle-less arm and short sleeve flannel. You had better just skip the hipster police for the sake of avoiding this sight for your own sake.
For marinated chicken: slice slightly thawed chicken breast in thirds along the long side (man I do really need to start cutting things in sevenths one of these days). It is smart to have the chicken not fully thawed so that you can actually grip the meat with your knife and not just push around flesh. Dump all the ingredients in a bowl and let it all soak for some time. Place the chicken breasts in a hot pan with coconut oil on bottom. Do not touch the chicken until white has crept up the sides. Flip—this should be your only interaction with the chicken while it is cooking. The less you play with it and flip it over and poke it, the more moist it will be. When the chicken has cooked on the second side for a minute. Turn off the burner and let the remnant heat of the pan do the rest of the cooking. The chicken is thin, so it should cook and be done while you let it rest. I promise for those of you who are paranoid, you will be 100% safe as long as you don’t buy Foster Farms… (okay so make sure it is cooked, but it should be just cooked and not any further). Let the chicken rest. Preferably let it cool down all the way for your “Cold Chews” sandwich. If you make your chicken the day before and put it in the fridge when you make the cold brew, then you only have to wait once instead of twice.
For the sandwich: take the chicken and slice it as thinly as possible. If you cut at a 45-degree angle less than orthogonal to the cutting board, this will be a whole lot easier. Butter one side of your bread and place butter side down in your pan and fry until golden. Flip and turn off heat. Take the buttered sides and have them facing the inside of your sandwich (if you butter both side then your hands will be oily when you touch the outside to eat it). Squirt yellow mustard on both pieces of bread (by the way whoever doesn’t believe in yellow mustard is obviously too stuck up to actually eat it. It is literally the greatest thing for savory sandwiches, surpassing even sliced bread). Layer chicken across the bread. Top with feta cheese (if you add this later then it will just roll off). Add romatoes and lettuce. Top with second piece of bread. Eat half your sandwich before realizing that you should probably blog about it. Stab it with a knife and snap your photo and then continue delving in.
Make Food Great Again 