On Failure and Freezers
Hint: It might not be you
When I was five, my dad stood me up on a stool next to the stove and taught me how to scramble an egg. I have been an avid home cook ever since. Cooking (and eating) delicious food has been a minor hobby of mine for about as long as I can remember. I read cookbooks for fun, love to try new techniques, and categorize meals into “necessary cooking” and “leisure cooking.” My sister and I put on Thanksgiving for thirty each year, with everything on the tables made from scratch; guests who insist on bringing something have learned that wine or flowers are the way to go.
All of this is a long-winded way of saying that I was quite a competent cook and had no difficulty feeding myself well when I set up my first kitchen, despite an often-packed schedule and a grad-student budget.
My first kitchen was a tiny galley built in 1915. It had never been renovated and still boasted its no-longer-functional electric ice box (in which I stored my dutch oven), just enough counter space to prep on one side of the sink and set dishes to dry on the other, and an apartment-sized refrigerator and half-sized gas range crammed so tightly into a small nook that there were scorch marks up the side of the fridge.
This kitchen served me brilliantly for eating well on a limited budget, both money and time, despite not concerning myself much with what I was spending on ingredients or how long I spent in the kitchen. I would whip up a quadruple batch of my favorite honey wheat bread about monthly, baking one loaf and freezing the other three as formed dough—pop one out of the freezer, let it thaw and rise in a bread pan while I was at work, bake it when I got home, and I had fresh bread every week. No muss, no fuss, and I only had to clean the big bowl once.
There is an infinite set of wonderful foods that scale brilliantly, many of which also freeze well. For a few more minutes of prep work, a double or triple batch assures delicious lunches all week and a good dinner on a future night when there isn't time to cook.
At some point, I fell out of the habit of doing this sort of bulk meal or ingredient prep, and making food appear when pressed for time or energy became a challenge. Less-than-optimal levels of reliance on takeout and Trader Joe's freezer meals ensued.
For years, I thought life had just got too complicated for that sort of meal planning. My mental bandwidth was shot. I just couldn't plan the way I used to.
Having accidentally solved my problem last month, I now realize every story I told myself about why I couldn't seem to plan or cook the way I used to is total, complete, and utter bunk.
In my apartment, I had a below-average (for 'Merica) sized fridge with a below-average (for 'Merica) sized freezer, and I shared it with no one. When the spousal unit and I moved in together, we got a larger fridge and attendant freezer, but I had to share it. This wasn't a problem until we ended up making cat food (long story) which meant that our house tiger got half the freezer to himself, and the spouse and I had to duke it out for the rest. By the time life had well and truly exploded, we had moved to the newest kitchen we’ve ever had, with the smallest and worst-designed freezer I’ve ever used, and our pocket tiger still had all of his dietary restrictions.
Did you catch the problem?
I realized, about 6 minutes after our1 new upright freezer was plugged in and cooled to temperature, that I am not the problem here. I never was the problem. It wasn't that something changed in or about me that made it harder to plan; there is simply no point in cooking all the shelf-stable dry beans, making them perishable, if I can't use them immediately or rely on having space in the freezer. Why make a big batch of something that will go bad before we can eat it?
At one point, we bought a chest freezer—a red herring if ever there was one—which simply added "keeping an accurate inventory" to my list of culinary failings. As I moved the impossible-to-see, difficult-to-access contents of that freezer into the larger, upright freezer with shelves and drawers, I found a whole container of char siu leftover from the last time I made a batch.
This is, itself, evidence that the old planning is intact: char siu is an ingredient in many wonderful Chinese (and Chinese diaspora) recipes. It takes awhile and makes more than anyone would use outside of a feast or restaurant setting. I made a large batch (the default size), portioned it out to amounts I'd include in a given meal, and squirreled it away in the freezer for Singapore noodles, moo shu pork, fried rice or any other dish that needs a little bit of that flavorful, bright red protein. But there wasn't room in the kitchen freezer2, so it ended up in the abyss that is our old chest freezer. Out of sight. Out of mind. Out of bellies.
Take a minute—right now—and think: What is something you used to be good at but don't seem to do anymore? Bonus points if it is something that causes significant friction in your life or is something you beat yourself up over.
Ok. What, in detail, did that entail?
What changed in your environment since you were good at that?
Chances are, you are not the problem. Something changed. And, perhaps, you can change it back.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have been craving Singapore noodles…
Scratch that: my. I'm not sharing.
I still have never had a standard (American) fridge. Someday, hopefully, I will have the good luck to be so bougie.