The grammar

Two years ago, a bunch of stuff happened in the world and I found myself stuck inside all spring, at the beginning of the harvest, with access to a lot of good food and nobody to cook it for. So I did what anyone would do in that situation, and I resolved to become an excellent home cook.

I was already a good home cook. The goal was to become an excellent home cook. I have ordered out precisely 3 times since. Everything else is home cooked.

The weather got warmer, more produce came in season, and I got more weary of existing, so I started turning out simpler things with only a few ingredients. I learned how long everything should be cooked for in a sheet pan. I learned a few basic techniques that work consistently well for every ingredient I typically use. I mixed and matched; I made stir-fries & soups where you could sub pretty much anything for pretty much anything. I sat on autopilot, planning everything ahead of time, biking to a local farm every Saturday to pick up my weekly CSA, and making big enough meals to keep in the fridge for a week.

I got better at cooking, as planned, but I also became more nimble, and I started to realize that I wasn’t really following any recipes. I was throwing really good vegetables on a baking sheet, covering everything with parm, and serving with a grain and a protein. I know there are other techniques, but this one worked well enough to become something I could hone. So I honed it, honed a few other techniques, made some basic concepts, and created a bit of a grammar around my cooking for the better part of a year.