I believe cooking is important. It enables us to eat healthier foods, and makes us more mindful of our place in the world. I honestly believe that cooking and eating together with family and friends grounds us and makes us happier.
I hear many people say they don’t have time to cook. I hear Michael Ruhlman say, ”bullshit” in response. And I have to agree. However, it would seem some people don’t.
This morning @Tanukipdx posted a lengthy (for twitter) screed about Ruhlman’s comment. In part:
Someone wants to say they are too uneducated/lazy/drug addled/asshurt or artistic to work they get sympathy. Someone is too self-indulgent/lazy/progressive/drug-addled/ or artistic to deal with society’s norms, laws and mores they get sympathy. But a working person struggling to balance the needs of their life who says they can’t find time to cook homemade meals? Ridicule them! Sir, you have grown too fucking self-satisfied and smug to be believed.
-from a post at TwitLonger
A couple things to note, given a cursory glance at the screed-author’s twitter stream: one, the stream appears to be the official Twitter account of a Portland Restaurant. Two, the author seems to relish a little confrontation.
My immediate question: who better to benefit from people feeling they’re too busy to cook than a restaurant?
That being said, I believe people use “too busy to cook” as an excuse. And in that way, it is bullshit. I’m amazed at what people find time to do. They go out to eat, they go to the gym, they spend hours in front of the television on a Sunday afternoon. They tend fake crops on Facebook. Maybe, rather than say they’re too busy, they should fess up and say they don’t enjoy cooking. Or that they don’t know how. Because to say you don’t have time is ridiculous.
Take me, for example. Cooking is important, as I’ve said, and so I make time for it. In addition to working full time as a Web developer for one of the Southeast’s premier health care systems, in addition to being an adjunct instructor at the community college. In addition to spending time with my family and finding time to write a novel (now in revisions), I still, somehow, inexplicably, find time to plan a menu every weekend. My wife and I find time to shop for groceries, depending on who is busier. I find time to make an awesome Sunday dinner for all of us, and I find time to create delicious, easy meals every other day of the week–breakfast and lunch for me, dinner for all of us. I don’t exercise as much as I should, certainly. And yes, some evenings I just can’t bring myself to go into the kitchen. Those nights we figure out something else. The thing is, I never say I’m too busy to work out. I just haven’t made time for it in my schedule. There are other things, like cooking and novel revisions, that are more important to me. That’s where I think Ruhlman’s “bullshit” comment comes in. If someone says he’s too busy to cook, he’s lying. He’s not too busy; other things are just more important.
Last night I got home from work and began cooking up a big pot of lentils. Not the fanciest of dinners, but delicious and wholesome. As they simmered, I changed out of my work clothes, and spent some time on the kitchen floor “cooking” with my eighteen-month-old son. I made sauteeing noises while he stirred a small potato and a splash of water in a small skillet. When the lentils were done, I served some plain for my daughter, then added kale for my wife and me. We all ate together at the dining room table, then went to the back yard to enjoy the cool spring evening. We ate ice cream, and it was awesome. And that’s why I’m never too busy to cook.
4 Comments
Greg, thank you for saying what I could never say as eloquently. I tend to think (but never say) “bullshit” to those who don’t have time to cook. You are correct, we’re simply not making time.
I really loved this entry, btw. It was beautiful.
I think you may be missing my point.
My point is not that making homemade meals is a bad thing, or that using sustainable ingredients isn’t a good thing to do.
My point is that it seems arrogant and smug for these people to be deciding what other people do and do not have enough time for in their own lives.
As to all those Ruhlman followers that replied with their tales of how they manage to make enough time to cook homemade meals despite a busy life- I say good on you! That is wonderful for you and your family.
What is not so wonderful is that it makes you feel superior to someone who may not have the wherewithal. The accusatory tone of these articles and blogs is what disturbs me.
But then again, I don’t know if “foodies” who have enough disposable income to buy $40 cookbooks and Sur La Table equipment spend enough time in their day to day lives with people who work two full time jobs while depending on an unreliable public transport system to empathize.
I’m very happy for all of you that have the time to make wonderful things for yourselves and your families. It is also very nice for you do be surrounded by other people as fortunate as yourselves.
Then again I know someone who Mon-Fri goes to work at 9am, gets off at 5 and goes straight to her next job where she works until midnight. Then Saturday she works from noon until midnight. And I know many more like her.
Go ahead and tell her she’s making excuses for getting take out 6 days a week.
Hi, Tanukipdx
Thanks so much for stopping by and making this clarifying comment.
I, too, know people like your friend who has to work three jobs just to make ends meet. I think it’s sad we live in a culture that refuses to pay a living wage to people.
I’m not going to tell her she’s making excuses, but I would tell her that she could probably find time on Sunday to supplement her take-out meals. Probably half of them. The folks I know around here seem to be able to that. However, they have enough help from family and community to be able to get to a grocery store or community garden, block out time on Sundays after church, and most have fairly reliable transportation.
I’d be interested to find out whether or not your friend is really “too busy” or, in fact, can’t really afford to cook from scratch. The stigma associated with being poor is such in this country that many who can’t afford store-bought food–that fast food provides cheaper empty calories than store-bought food is another, horrible matter–But the stigma associated with being poor might mean that many who can’t afford to cook instead say they don’t have time or are too busy. And yes, this says nothing of folks who end up without reliable transportation and thus can’t count on a weekly trip to the grocery store.
I’ve written about economy and food justice in a number of posts on a different blog:
http://tumblr.steampoweredmedia.com/post/544304798/kfcs-double-down-healthier-than-salad-fast-food
http://tumblr.steampoweredmedia.com/post/533390763/indefensible-i-believe-i-have-been-unclear
http://tumblr.steampoweredmedia.com/post/484393264/sarabellum42-unhealthy-habits-are-one-factor-in
It’s true many self-described “foodies” (god, what a horrific term) come across as smug and arrogant. They probably are. I can be, too. I think, though, many who can afford to cook at home still don’t, and they use the “I’m busy” excuse far too readily.
Anyway, when I call bullshit on someone who says he’s too busy to cook, please understand my bullshit is as wide-ranging as possible. It’s bullshit that we don’t pay living wages. It’s bullshit we don’t teach cooking skills. It’s bullshit we supplement the most horrific food this nation has to offer and create regulation that makes it nearly impossible for people to install a real, working community farm in their neighborhood’s vacant lots. I’m calling bullshit on the stigma associated with poverty that would prevent someone from saying, “I can’t afford to eat grocery store food.” I’m calling bullshit on all that, every piece of it. I hope more people do, too. Because when we have enough folks calling it out, then all that smugness will turn into action.
Thanks for this Greg!
I adore cooking, so it comes naturally for me to make time to cook. I have 3 jobs, as well, and find gym time, family time, friend time and internet time and…drinking time.
It is definitely easy to dedicate time to cooking when you have an interest in cooking for any reason – health, creative outlet, fulfilling the need to nurture others, or maybe just ..wait for this one…hunger. Mark’s been picking up my Cooking Light magazines and finding simple, healthy meals to make for dinner that have few ingredients. I like having a garden that produces fresh veggies for us. Mark couldn’t care less about caring for the garden, but he enjoys its rewards. So, I know there are folks at all levels of awareness or care for healthy, local or just homemade foods who can find time to cook.
I really do think excuses are just choices one makes for its self. Folks are choosing something else over cooking. And obviously, it isn’t necessary to be a foodie to create a tasty homemade meal.
Thanks for a peek into your evening.