I’m good at the self-centered, me-first sort of living thing. Hell, most of us could win employee of the month in that category. We’ve got that rugged individualist out of American legend role down pat – each of us hell-bent on living the American Dream, not caring who we have to screw-over to get what we want along the way. Strangely enough it isn’t working too well for us. Instead of launching us each into a nirvana-like state of self-actualization and bliss, this narcissistic soul-masturbation is tearing us apart. The white picket fence and car in every driveway dream we were sold (complete with well stocked supermarkets of course) failed us. In the “every man for himself” scramble we lost our connection with each other, with the people who produce our food, and with the earth it grew in. And as the community that defines our humanity crumbled around us, we lost a part of ourselves as well.
Take the food we buy in those well-stocked supermarkets. As long as the tomatoes stay cheap, we don’t care if the guy who picked them is paid an unlivable wage or was trafficked into this country and kept as a slave to work in the fields. We don’t care if villages in Pakistan have no access to clean water because a major water bottle company obtained exclusive rights to their local spring. We just want our bottled water. Me-first all the way baby.
Or take the ubiquitous canned-food drive. As we clean out our pantries, instead of asking what are the healthy foods people who can’t afford to buy food might need or even desire to eat, we toss them the nasty crap we want to get rid of anyway. Or we go to the store and buy the ultra-cheap generic foods full of trans-fats, preservatives, and “that-color-sure-as-hell-doesn’t-exist-in-nature” food dyes. It’s far more about us feeling good about ourselves (or cleaning out our pantry) than it is about giving food to others.
This is why we so desperately need to cook well. As crazy as it sounds, it can function as the antidote to our disease.
Cooking well pushes us beyond ourselves. Cooking well allows our family to come together to share and enjoy a meal at the same table. Cooking well ensures that our children can have healthy and nutritious food that strengthens their minds and bodies. Cooking well implies caring that the people who grow our food are treated with dignity and respect and paid the wages they deserve. Cooking well challenges the continued rape and destruction of the earth for the sake of high yield and momentary convenience. Cooking well reconnects us with who we are, with the people we love, and with the community around us.
Food holds power. It brings people together. For too long we’ve used food to divide, oppress, and destroy. Let’s start cooking well so that we can get over ourselves and start healing the world instead.
Cooking well is the antidote to our disease of being self-centered jerks. It forces us to care not only for the people we’re cooking for, but also for where our food came from.