Americans love convenience. A quick snack to grab and go. A pouch to throw in the microwave that is ready to eat in five minutes. Our American food culture is based on convenience. Perhaps that why so many Americans have so little interest in cooking.
There’s plenty of joy in the taste of freshly prepared but there’s nothing convenient about cooking from scratch.
What does it take to cook? It takes time. And skill. And financial means. And commitment. And patience. Cooking is the opposite of convenience. The US leads the globe in the development and marketing of ultra-processed. And I don’t see our passion for #UPF fading any time soon.
Consider the time and labor required to put that seafood stew together! For starters, I needed to assemble 15 ingredients which included a good brand of imported Italian pelati (peeled tomatoes), some cod and shrimp, jarred roasted peppers, olive oil, an honest baguette, and the usual aromatics – onion, fennel, parsley, garlic. And I decided to use heritage white beans so they needed to be prepared before I could start. All that before I could walk into the kitchen and begin the job of washing, chopping, cooking, and cleaning up.
The nutrition label is my best approximation of a serving based on the recipe that inspired me. Roughly speaking, the proportions serve 4 to 6 people and the Facts Label reflect nutrients for 4 servings.
Salted to taste with just the right amount to highlight the other flavors but never so much that salt overpowers. There’s a special forces unit of the food police that monitors compliance with Dietary Guidelines and they will bang on my head for using too much salt. Aside from that, however, there’s not much else for the unit to complain about. Good fiber. Good protein. And lots of potassium.
Why would anyone work as hard as I did to put that beautiful mixture of fish and aromatics and tomato and beans on the plate? Because the joys of freshly prepared are no more and no less than the pleasure we humans derive from fueling our bodies with food that tastes really really good.