Random cooking, random recipes

when you are just cooking…

Cooking is almost always random for me. I don’t follow many set schedules or rules. Anything I cook, I insist on being in season, and I try to source ingredients as locally as possible. I support small farmers and artisanal produce. I don’t want to waste anything, whether it’s ingredients or prepared food. I sincerely believe you are what you eat. You have a responsibility first to your body, which naturally extends to a responsibility towards your environment.

That’s it.

Apart from these common-sense principles, cooking is an adventure, an inspiration, and a joy.

me at the helm of a pot

Most of the time, I listen to what my palate craves. Sometimes, I find myself in front of the fridge, simply looking for inspiration. Inspiration comes in the form of a taste that lingers in my mouth, as if I’ve already eaten. Does this happen to you too? As if gone through a meal and you are left with an “aftertaste” before even eating? For me, it happens before I cook.

That “supposed aftertaste” dictates what I want to eat for the upcoming meal. I draw on the ingredients I have at hand, and suddenly, I know what I will be cooking. It is never an exercise of making sure everything in the dish relates perfectly, but more of an insight, an intuition, really.

Thank God, having learned cooking with my mother from a very young age onwards and after years of experience in my restaurant kitchen, I know how to reach that aftertaste by way of technique.

At times, I also find myself salivating at the thought of a well-known Istanbul recipe from my childhood. In such cases, I don’t meddle with the original; I stick to the rules and don’t tolerate deviation. But apart from executing a traditional recipe, I am an intuitive cook; the ingredients, the inspiration, and the availability guide me. It is always an adventure that, luckily, ends well.

Over the years, both as a home cook and a professional, I have only had one true failure. That one cauliflower soup! It should have been easy, and when I finally managed it on my third try, it turned out to be a simple delicacy.

It was cauliflower season, and the farmer had plenty and would be delivering some next week. Since I didn’t, and still don’t, favour thickening soups with roux, I preferred using plenty of the main ingredient. So, a soup seemed like an easy solution to use a lot of it at once. I had written it on the menu for the coming week. On the day I was supposed to make it, my reluctance to cook this cauliflower soup led to a definite failure. We had to remove it from the menu and quickly arrange for a replacement soup. Thankfully, the menu was changing daily and was not printed on any paper but handwritten on a chalkboard.

Everyone marvelled at how I changed the menu daily with many new dishes each week. Of course, we planned for it, but this gave me freedom. I cooked at the restaurant the way I cook at home: What do I have? What is in season? What did our farmers provide us with? What do I want to eat? What do I want to cook?

I know this sounds whimsical, and yes, it was to a certain extent, but there was serious planning involved. To write down a menu for the coming week, we needed to talk with the farmers and vendors to see what was coming our way, supply our other provisions, and I would take personal notes on any new dish I was planning to cook in detail. Even those details could change at the last minute when I took my place at the helm of the pot.

That was another lifetime.

Now, I am a home cook, and I enjoy cooking for us, setting a proper table for two, sometimes having friends over—never formal—good wine, sharing stories, and laughter. A true enjoyment of life.