I love food and I love to cook. Many an anniversary celebration has seen my spouse and I indulging in a delicious but way-too-expensive tasting menu. We marvel at the flavor coaxed out of spaghetti squash strands (butter; the secret is always butter), debate the merits of chia seed foam (we’re both “meh” on foam in general), and critique the dessert presentation (three different types of coulis on a pie plate is two too many).
It’s decadent and fun and a splurge that we used to indulge in every few years—until a fateful dinner at an unassuming trattoria in Florence, Italy, where I had the best tomato sauce of my life. According to the waiter, it only contained five ingredients: fresh tomatoes, onion, carrots, olive oil and salt. No garlic. No basil. No infused vinegars or long-stored confits.
It was simple and satisfying, and it didn’t even take very long to cook. I was suitably impressed. But it would take me nearly a decade—and a life-threatening medical diagnosis for each of us that taught us that we should eat to live, rather than live to eat—before I fully appreciated the lesson of that delicious peasant sauce. And that is this: Eating simply isn’t boring, and it can even be the opposite of boring.
To me, eating simply doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy my food. It just means I don’t need all the fancy ingredients. Apologies to lovers of pink salt and truffle salt, but a canister of sea salt seasons all the dishes cooked in my kitchen with aplomb. Once enamored of the exotic fruit aisles at the local Asian market, I now stick to a few favorites—and only when they are in season. I indulge my old foodie tendencies by combining fresh, ordinary ingredients in new ways, occasionally trying out new recipes (as long as they don’t require me to buy five new pantry items), and limiting the time spent on meal prep while cooking healthy, tasty meals.
Some favorites include:
homemade arepas topped with black beans, sauteed mushrooms, spicy cheese, and salsa
warm tofu simmered in water (it’s the most delicious way to prepare tofu, I promise you), served with sauteed green beans and a quick sauce made of sesame oil, soy sauce, chopped garlic, sugar and scallions
skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs roasted on a bed of chopped onions, carrots, butternut squash and garlic
No fancy sauces, no extra cooking equipment, no laborious prep needed. Just simple, good food.
To those of us who don’t use food as an artistic medium, who aren’t recipe innovators, and who don’t need to try all the things before we die, eating to live is the way to go. But it doesn’t have to be boring.
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