When I was still young and ambitious, I made a list of things I wanted to do with my time on earth. One of the items on my list was that I would try a new recipe every week while at university [like I said I was VERY ambitious]. I had discovered that engineering has the tendency to become mundane and drab - especially all those core courses in 3rd year. There are days I seriously considered jumping off the balcony. I had also discovered that, for me, cooking is therapeutic. Every meal was an opportunity to make something grand, something divine. In addition, if it doesn't work out, I could always throw it in the trash and start all over again.
I always felt like engineering was very confining. You are under so much pressure to get it right the first time, and rightly so. The resources [time, people, finances, infrastructure] that go into composing an engineering solution are immense. You literally can't afford to think about second chances. If anything, if you are not sure you can come up with a solution, it's better for you to step away and let someone else, who hopefully knows what they are doing, take over. There are instances where brute force works [usually it is later referred to as a creative quirky alternative]. However, you usually need to know what you're doing. You need to put the effort [time, money and infrastructure] into making sure you know what you are doing. While the boost you get from finding a solution can be intense, I was drowning in the boredom of following the same patterns. Cooking offered me a 20 minute escape each day into some other space.
Based on the time I've taken to draw out the background story, you'd think that I followed through with my plan. Nope. Nada. Apana. Nedda. First of all, I was a broke foreign student, living on a very small fixed income. I could barely afford a few apples a week, let alone fresh produce to make awesome meals. Secondly, school took up too much time to allow much else. At some point I was sleeping in computer labs and running on energy bars, energy drinks and coffee. I only visited my flat to shower and change. There was no time to cook real food. It's a wonder I lost so much weight [or maybe not]. I think the only real meal I had was Pick n Pay chips on Sunday after church.
Another thing on my list of things to do was to marry my, then boyfriend, and now, husband. Today was a good day for us. We were dancing at noon to End of the Road by Boyz II Men. Then later on we were dancing in the garden when we noticed that one of the shrubs we had transplanted a month ago was budding. Joy oh joy!
As it turns out, the marriage to the husband led to the fulfilment of the culinary dreams I had. He is a real dream maker :) One night we were watching Andy Bates on the Food Network as he prepared Baba ganoush. So we decided to try it out yesterday. That was a good day too. The day before wasn't so great. I baked chicken and potatoes in the oven. Sadly, I put so much salt in the chicken that it was almost inedible. But he was so supportive. We bathed the food in ketchup and joked about the day's activities, like all was well.
We're thinking of growing our own food now. Every once in a while he brings me yams, pumpkin or corn from the plot we have on the outskirts of the city. Recently, he decided he wants to get into fish farming. He included my dreams in his plans. He says he's setting up some sort of eco-system to grow fruit and vegetables in water which is "fertilised" by the waste from the fish. He's tried to explain aquaphonics to me. My engineering background, dictates that I understand flow rates, pumps and power sources. But I can only follow for so long before I catch myself gazing dreamily into his eyes.
This culinary adventure has included my family and friends as well. We've done baking Saturdays, hosted graduation parties, played with fruit smoothie and juice concoctions. One year we had Christmas Made in India with exotic curries and oven baked naans. Perhaps, it was a good thing I didn't do what I had planned to do all by my lonesome all those years ago.
I am tempted to post some photos of our escapades in the kitchen. But that would not make this a true journal any more. A picture is 1000 words, or so they say. Well, 1000 words is what I'll try to do. But for today, we'll cheat a little. We're strolling to a nearby supermarket to buy my favourite muffins.
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