This so super interesting to read, and thank you so much for sharing my latest article.
I loved the description of how you and your family live: it reminds me so much of how we live now, with my grandma downstairs and my parents next door.
Your article was sooo relatable! Really appreciate your work. I’ve found that moving into an inter-generational home has been such a positive change in my life.
I think it's important to accept that our relationship to cooking can change with life and circumstance. In true Italian style (my Scottish family has lived in/outside Rome since 1970), my parents live below my daughter and her family, and I live less than a 10 minute walk away. During lockdown we established once a week family meals, and when everyone is working my 91 year old father most often volunteers to cook. From time to time, we all do an extra batch cook for everyone's freezer. In the winter months, self-care for me is making sure my freezer is full of home-cooked soup, roasted veg, lasagne, lentils, so that during the week when I get home tired and cold, I always have something delicious to eat. One of my friends doesn't give birthday or seasonal gifts, she just cooks and bakes for us, and when someone is sick, she'll fill up their freezer. I can happily eat the same thing day after day, and living alone, I often do - cooking for other people makes me try new recipes, or rehash old ones.
Cooking for me now is all about love, and sharing, and choosing to do that, but when I had a small child and was doing all the cooking every day for my extended family, it was often just a chore and an endless grind, with the pressure of having to make endless decisions every day. Even now, when my beloved nieces come and stay with me, I triumphantly get one meal out of the way and then am crushed by the thought that in a few short hours I'll have to make another one.
Exactly! And I know what you mean about the crushing pressure of feeling like preparing food requires endless decisions all day, every day. It really is why I shut down in the kitchen when my mental health was very bad. But it's been through that experience that I have realized it's ok and completely normal to have a fluctuating relationship with cooking.
The arrangement you described with your family and friend is amazing - those relationships, people showing up for us, that's what ultimately helps and makes the biggest difference.
This is such a wonderful piece. My relationship to cooking changed when I moved out of my (Italian-Canadian) parents' house and then promptly got laid off from the full-time job that had made that move possible in the first place - issues of time and money took precedence over taste, complexity and personal preference, although not necessarily quality. Since then, a constantly shifting array of food intolerances and mental illnesses, including anorexia, have had a huge bearing on my relationship to food and cooking. I love the way you so carefully and compassionately look at your relationship with cooking, which can be so beautiful, difficult, complex and ever-evolving all at the same time.
Thank you so much for sharing here, Liana. I was always been hard on myself for not being (what I considered) consistent with my cooking. But, like you said, it’s a relationship in constant evolution.
This so super interesting to read, and thank you so much for sharing my latest article.
I loved the description of how you and your family live: it reminds me so much of how we live now, with my grandma downstairs and my parents next door.
Your article was sooo relatable! Really appreciate your work. I’ve found that moving into an inter-generational home has been such a positive change in my life.
I think it's important to accept that our relationship to cooking can change with life and circumstance. In true Italian style (my Scottish family has lived in/outside Rome since 1970), my parents live below my daughter and her family, and I live less than a 10 minute walk away. During lockdown we established once a week family meals, and when everyone is working my 91 year old father most often volunteers to cook. From time to time, we all do an extra batch cook for everyone's freezer. In the winter months, self-care for me is making sure my freezer is full of home-cooked soup, roasted veg, lasagne, lentils, so that during the week when I get home tired and cold, I always have something delicious to eat. One of my friends doesn't give birthday or seasonal gifts, she just cooks and bakes for us, and when someone is sick, she'll fill up their freezer. I can happily eat the same thing day after day, and living alone, I often do - cooking for other people makes me try new recipes, or rehash old ones.
Cooking for me now is all about love, and sharing, and choosing to do that, but when I had a small child and was doing all the cooking every day for my extended family, it was often just a chore and an endless grind, with the pressure of having to make endless decisions every day. Even now, when my beloved nieces come and stay with me, I triumphantly get one meal out of the way and then am crushed by the thought that in a few short hours I'll have to make another one.
Exactly! And I know what you mean about the crushing pressure of feeling like preparing food requires endless decisions all day, every day. It really is why I shut down in the kitchen when my mental health was very bad. But it's been through that experience that I have realized it's ok and completely normal to have a fluctuating relationship with cooking.
The arrangement you described with your family and friend is amazing - those relationships, people showing up for us, that's what ultimately helps and makes the biggest difference.
Thank you for sharing your story and perspective!
This is such a wonderful piece. My relationship to cooking changed when I moved out of my (Italian-Canadian) parents' house and then promptly got laid off from the full-time job that had made that move possible in the first place - issues of time and money took precedence over taste, complexity and personal preference, although not necessarily quality. Since then, a constantly shifting array of food intolerances and mental illnesses, including anorexia, have had a huge bearing on my relationship to food and cooking. I love the way you so carefully and compassionately look at your relationship with cooking, which can be so beautiful, difficult, complex and ever-evolving all at the same time.
Thank you so much for sharing here, Liana. I was always been hard on myself for not being (what I considered) consistent with my cooking. But, like you said, it’s a relationship in constant evolution.
Such a stunning piece of writing!
Thank you so much for reading, sharing, supporting!