Food is an experience. It's the best way to get to know a culture, a region, a country. That while my opinion may be heavily influenced by watching and reading way too much Anthony Bourdain. Which I am completely fine with that. The one thing that I learned in following this idea tho is there is an even better experience that comes with food, that's cooking it yourself.
We used to have the traditional family dinner every Sunday and it was one of the things the whole family looked forward to throughout the week. While I was young it was very much a “stay out of the kitchen” event though. My mom and dad would be in the kitchen for a couple hours and produce some of the best tasting food we could get. As I got older I was allowed in the kitchen and got the chance to help out.
My favorite time doing this was when we would have BLT Sunday's. After my first time cooking bacon having watched my mother do it for years, it was my turn. The best part about it was the fact that on that night my grandfather immediately noticed a difference in the bacon. Once told I had cooked it he decreed that I was the only one that could cook bacon from now on.
It was an amazing feeling. Never before had I really cooked anything. (Let's face it instant ramen doesn't count as cooking.) Since then I've loved being in the kitchen cooking. Experimenting with different herbs and spices, trying new recipes and tweaking them.
Through the years tho I've found one of the best parts of cooking, again in my opinion. It had been right in front of me for years. Cooking with your significant other. I've done it a couple times now with a couple different girlfriends and each time it was amazing. Cooking is such a low-stress thing to do when you're doing it just for yourself and it's so much more fun with someone. Sharing a small kitchen with someone and working side by side you manage to learn a lot about that person. How much stress they can take, how careful they are, how much or how little they like to follow 'rules.' Then too there's a sense of fun to it as well.
I remember one of the funniest times was cooking chicken and my friend at the time was tenderizing the chicken as I cooked it. She was pounding the hell out of this chicken. We joked about her getting her stress out that way for a bit and then she opened up to me and told me about what she had been going through.
Cooking and sharing the act of cooking are both amazing things. Not only for the excitement of knowing the food you're going to eat was prepared by you but being able to share an experience with someone and grow closer in the process. If you never cook, cook rarely, have never cooked with someone, try it. It could be an amazing experience for you and even lead to a new passion.
