Of all the things I inherited from my mother, cooking is possibly the most positive. That is to say, I love cooking. I do it seasonally, though. In the Valley, you sorta have to. Especially when you don’t have central cooling and temperatures are hotter inside than they are outside.
Every autumn and winter, when the cool days come in and the breeze flows freely throughout the house, namely the kitchen, the stove and oven are brought back to life. Pies and cakes and famous dishes - ones that I’ve made my own - waft their scents, calling upon relatives to peek in and see what’s cooking. I even try a couple of new recipes that caught my attention during my off season.
The only problem I have with cooking, however, is that I live in a jumbled mess. That is to say, I am my mother’s child. My mother doesn’t believe in spice racks. In fact, I only remember one from when I was a child. It was a wall spice rack, mounted near the stove that had the bad habit of falling down whenever a storm violently shook the house.
No, Mom believed in everything in its place. The only problem was, those places varied constantly.
“Mom,” I’d call out, “where’s the oregano?”
“Check the pantry.”
“I did.”
“Check the bread box.”
“Nope, not there either.”
“I’ll go to the store and get a new one.”
Every Christmas, I think of it being the year that I finally get over my kitchen spice racks. And every year, I get her a movie or book she’s been longing to watch or read. Maybe, I should just buy the spice rack for myself. Or maybe, like Mom, I’ll just wait until someone gets one for me.
Either way, I couldn’t see the harm of owning one. Jyg has one and her family seems happy about it. Of course, everything in its place is different there. That meaning, everything should be returned where you got it. I may have moved a couple of spices around the last time I cooked there. I hope that wasn’t too much of a problem.
And as Summer exits and Autumn returns at snail’s pace - let’s face it, every season but Summer arrives late to the Valley - cooking season is just around the corner. And already, I have started to arrange the spices in a logical order, placing them in the bread box - which has never been used for bread, mind you - that sits to the left of our stove.
