Notes from my Cookbook Collection II

The Secret of Cooking by Bee Wilson

Bee Wilson might be the best food writer around today (perhaps along with Tamar Adler, see this previous post for more). I have been following Wilson’s work for a while; a couple of chapters of her brilliant book The Way We Eat Now are required readings for the Mediterranean Nutrition & Gastronomy course I teach at the Food Studies & Gastronomy Program of the University of Barcelona.

Though she is an experienced and renowned food writer, The Secret of Cooking is Wilson’s first cookbook, and in a way her most personal book to date. Casually a few times in the book, Wilson reveals that the act of cooking was able to bring her back from grief to joy after her longtime husband left her for another woman. Mind you, this is not a book based on grief; it’s full of joy. The husband leaving anecdote is just that: an anecdotal side note. Although it must have turned her world upside down, she does not dwell on the grief part, but rather turns it to her -and her readers’- advantage.

What is so special about this book is its subtle yet decisive allusion to the things most cookbooks silence -hence the “secret” in the book’s title: those unsung little things most experienced cooks (the ones who write cookbooks) take for granted, such as the time it takes to go shopping or the headspace required -and the stressful it can be- to meal plan, especially when you are trying to put food on the table for several people with different tastes and needs. Wilson voices things as basic -yet unsung- as having a trivet or a bowl for your scraps at hand while you cook.

“As with many things in life, you need to be middle-aged to appreciate how great it is,” she claims on page 136, in reference to a hand-held stick blender. Having just turned 50 myself, I could not agree or understand this phrase more. It’s the little things…and Wilson appreciates them, and sings their praise in beautiful prose. Her ode to the box grater -literal, and also a figurative way to encourage us to use what we already have in your kitchen, instead of running out to buy all the latest fancy tools that are marketed to us on social media- is as symbolic as it is pragmatic.

What I perhaps love most about this book is that Wilson is an unabashed reader. She is not afraid to say she learned this idea or that recipe from a book she read, and there are so many references she drops along the way. Almost every recipe has one, whether it’s a book or a person she learned that particular recipe from. Thus Wilson reminds us how we really learn to cook -even cookbook writers learn from other sources, written, oral, or gustatory. No recipe comes from a vacuum; we are constantly re-writing, interpreting, making recipes our own again. To quote from another recent book I have been reading and loving, Rebecca May Johnson’s Small Fires, every time we cook from a recipe we subtly deviate from it, and each of these new interpretations is in itself a performance of the recipe. Wilson’s references include a very broad selection, from classics such as The Zuni Café Cookbook, to little-known gems, that it makes me want to go back through the book and compile them all, and add them to my list. Wilson is, I am sure, a great curator. I just might do that.

My beloved Yotam has called Wilson “the ultimate food scholar”. Yes, Wilson’s writing is scholarly, but it’s never pedantic, always accessible. A great example of this attitude is when, waxing poetic on her love of eggs, she goes into the reasons why a teaspoon of Dijon mustard can take your omelet to the next level. She casually describes the science of it and mentions in passing having written to food science authority Harold McGee to decipher the exact cause, and why it happens with Dijon but not powdered mustard. Yes all of this is fine but the science is not the point; it’s about the sheer joy of making and eating your own top-level, silky-soft homemade omelet. “Devour, imagining that you are having a love affair in a bistro in Paris, the kind that sells rough red wine by the carafe.” (p. 179). How simple the great pleasure are, in Wilson’s book. I second that. Maybe it’s middle age.

The Secret of Cooking is in fact a cookbook, i.e. it contains many recipes, but it is also a book about techniques, and about how not to lose your mind or stress too much over getting good food on the table. It’s about bringing back play and joy to the time we spend in the kitchen (even, yes, while you wash up…not quite sure I’ve made it to that one yet).

The concept of repertoire comes back again and again in the book: having a list (and I think it should be a written and not figurative one, as I find lately that too many ideas in my head at once leaves me scatter-brained and anxious: in the writing them down we record them and don’t need to worry so much) of recipes you can count on and fall back on once and again for any occasion. A repertoire or list of dishes you like eating, cooking, and serving will save you from any stress when entertaining, as well as leave more headspace for daily life. It’s also a good idea, and I love Wilson for thinking of this and writing about it, for that list to have as many recipes as possible that accommodate different dietary needs and restrictions. Serving foods family style instead of on individually plated is another technique for making meals more comfortable to share and thus comforting to everyone at the table.

For desserts, for example, Wilson herself is amazed at how many great desserts can be kept completely gluten and dairy free. And the recipe I am sharing with you from the book is one of them. Since the post I wrote for my birthday didn’t have cake (because I almost always prefer savory food), I thought this one should, so here it goes, and a chocolatey one to boot.