First Person: Cooking my way to calm

I take a sprig of rosemary and toss it into the bubbling pot. Stirring my soup with a wooden spoon, I breathe in the soothing steam. I watch the carrots, celery, chicken and noodles soak up the broth. It’s been a long week. But now, I’m in the kitchen, taking in the smells and flavours of my homemade chicken noodle soup, and for a moment, everything feels all right.

Cooking makes me feel present. Whether I’m trying a new recipe or throwing together something simple and familiar, it’s become a way to relax and unwind after a day filled with deadlines and responsibilities. I’m no Julia Child or Gordon Ramsay. But in my own way, I have made the kitchen my sanctuary, a break from the stresses of daily life.

I didn’t always feel this way. When I first lived on my own as a student and found myself responsible for three meals a day, cooking was just one more thing to worry about, a tedious waste of my time. Why would I spend the few free hours I had toiling away in the kitchen when mac and cheese, frozen pizzas and Door Dash were available? And does anyone really enjoy slicing up onions, peeling potatoes and removing sticky skins from garlic?

Living on your own for the first time means adapting to a new lifestyle. A lifestyle without the comforts you may take for granted when living at home. And like many other students, I struggled with navigating my new independence and responsibilities. Balancing work, school and cooking seemed like an impossible challenge. Food delivery apps became the easy way out.

Many others feel the same. A recent study by Dalhousie University’s Agri-Food Analytics Lab found that one in four Canadians use food delivery apps on a regular basis, up from one in five in 2020. Millennials and Gen Z have the highest rates of use.

But I started to wonder what I was missing by relying on quick and convenient meals. I slowly began experimenting with recipes and pushed myself to do more than the bare minimum. It wasn’t easy. I overcooked dishes, added too much salt, not enough salt, cut and burned myself and even melted a spatula. But I was learning. And even though I wasn’t a great chef, the payoff of making something delicious became really rewarding and addictive.

I began to see cooking as something other than just work, and that made me appreciate it. When it stopped being something I had to do and instead became an opportunity for experimentation and creativity, I started to look forward to it every day. It was okay that I made mistakes. It was sometimes my one chance to relax during the day.

During this time, I started looking for inspiration and stories that captured that feeling. That search led me to Anthony Bourdain. I began watching Parts Unknown, one of the late Bourdain’s popular TV shows, where he travels to different countries and explores their cultures and cuisines. He treated food as a sort of universal way to bridge the gaps between people. Parts Unknown showed me that there was a human connection with food that went beyond cultural or national boundaries. As I developed my own relationship with food and cooking, the show’s messages began to deeply resonate with me. Even if we don’t speak the same language, have the same interests, or even share the same values, one thing most people can probably agree on is that we love a good meal.

Of course, there is nothing wrong with ordering food or eating quick and convenient meals; I still do it. And as a student, you sometimes don’t have the time to cook, and that’s okay. But I do believe people might feel a little better if they tried.

Cooking now simply makes me happy. In a world as uncertain as ours, any opportunity to feel calm, comfortable and content, even for a brief moment, is priceless. For me, cooking is just a chance to enjoy life on my own weird little terms. I’m grateful that I will always have something that brings me comfort and joy, and I hope it can be the same for others.

My soup is finally ready. I take out my spoon and fill my bowl with a satisfying, warm serving. I sip it down, and I’m reminded that sometimes it’s the smallest things that can bring a sense of calm to a busy life.