How I'm Thinking about Food in 2024
Your Friend in Food #10: Jan 8 2024
Happy 2024 friends! We made it to week 1 of the year! I hope your New Year's was lovely and you ushered it in with some good company, great food, and maybe a fun tradition or two. I’m a big fan of eating 12 grapes with each strike of the bells at midnight. The tradition originated in Valencia, Spain when Alicantese vine growers in 1909 popularized the 17th century to encourage sales after an abundant year (classic!). Eating grapes is said to bring good luck and ward off evil spirits.
Thank you to the 16 new subscribers who’ve joined this week! Welcome! I hope you enjoy it :)
This year, I broke up with a tedious New Year’s tradition. For the past 26 years, I’ve been waking up ready to write a list of lofty goals and resolutions that I know I’ll probably stop doing by Feb 28. Run that marathon. Buy 5 pieces of clothing. Meatless Monday all year. For my 27th year, I wanted to focus on building strong pillars (health, relationships, self-esteem, career) and establishing philosophies around the habits I’ve formed. I’ve been especially thinking about how I want to consume and experience food in 2024.
Here are a few themes and principles that I want to remind myself of in 2024. I also played around with Midjourney to make fun images based on the themes. I’m still green with the application but it’s been a fun creative exercise. Maybe this AI stuff isn’t so bad after all :))
KNOW YOUR GROWERS
This was a core principle in my home especially having an agricultural economist for a dad. I will acknowledge that it is a massive privilege to shop at grocery stores and know that we can find whatever we need to eat in abundance. Yet I feel like it is not a natural way to experience buying food. I want to build relationships that are not just transactional but rooted in learning and appreciation about the food that is making it to our tables. I think I can do this by doing more of my grocery shopping at the farmers market or mercado! My friend Nasim (you probably know him as lahbco on Instagram) does this really well! We recently had a friend date at the Union Square Farmer’s Market and I just loved observing him taking his time to feel his vegetables, talk to the farmers and grocers, checking in on them and asking about their families. It inspired me to build connections, ask questions about the seasons and the quality of crops, and get some recommendations on how to cook my produce or meat.
LEAVE IT TO THE PROS
The beauty of living in this information age is we have access to any recipe or guide to make something. Want to make croissants? Here are 50,000 recipes with shortcuts, techniques, and hacks. Feeling adventurous and want to cure your own jamon? Here’s a 20 hr Masterclass. As much as I love a weekend baking project that will yield delicious goods and an apartment that smells like my favourite bakery, I also love heading to my local bakery for a good baguette or batard, a solid loaf of sourdough, or some unique dessert that will pick me up. In following the mantra above, I also want to take time and get to appreciate the work of the pros that have made it their lives work to feed people. Bakers, butchers, cheesemongers, gelato makers, cake artists, wine merchants, and speciality shops, at least in my experience, are eager to answer questions and share things that they’re excited about. I’ll trust their expertise to guide my eating.
GROCERIES WITH ADVENTURE
When it comes to home cooking, I’m a chronic creature of habit. I go through phases where I can eat the same oatmeal bowl for breakfast or grains and greens rice bowl for lunch. Once I get the hang of my grocery store or market, I just keep reaching out for the same things. It’s like I could shop with my eyes closed. In the spirit of trying new things and techniques, I want to add one or two things I’ve never tried before into my cart or basket. Maybe it's a bright, spiky romanesco to sub my cauliflower or a sauce like kecap manis (Indonesian sweet sauce) that could add some flavour to my protein. I think it’s an exciting way to expand your palette and bring some excitement to home cooking which can be tedious sometimes.
LEAN INTO THE SEASONS
If I were to grade my seasonal eating, I would probably get a B+. I do my best to shop local and organic and keep up with what’s in season for produce but I could always do more. Yes, we are blessed to be able to access tomatoes year round and what a joy it is but I think our world is better for it if we appreciate produce at its peak. Farmers wouldn’t have to grow the same crops to meet consumer demand but get to make the things that are good for the earth at the time. California-based olive oil company Brightland shares produce for
THE FRIDGE IS YOUR OYSTER
I’m a rule follower and sometimes need guidance from the pros to make my home cooking more fun. Once I open up my NYT cooking app or open up a cookbook, I know we mean business. I have good taste when it comes to picking recipes but I want to challenge myself to cook based on vibes and my intuitions. I’ve always admired my mother for her ability to look into our family fridge (we’re an ingredients household) and make a 3-course dinner. I thought it was mostly magic but it’s about having a solid foundation. Her spice cabinet is well stocked, she always has pantry essentials and vegetables to build a solid foundation, and sauces aka pantry accessories to bring a boost of acid, sweetness or umami.
I want to challenge myself to make a few meals each week simply by sight and by the flavour profile, I’m feeling. I tried it this week and made a garden salad, pan-seared salmon that I coated in a brown sugar mustard sauce, and some golden fried rice topped with some sambal goreng. I feel like this is a sustainable approach to taking stock of what's in your fridge.
LITTLE TO NO WASTE
One of my toxic traits is that I eat with my eyes and not my stomach. I sometimes order a little too much food at dinner or buy a little too much at the grocery store. I’m trying to be more conscious of my consumption this year, especially regarding food. According to the United States Environment Program, roughly a third of the food made each year goes to waste. That amounts to 1.3 billion tons!!! To do my teeny part in bringing this number down, I’m trying a few things like keeping a note in my calendar of what’s in the fridge, grocery shopping in small batches so I’m only eating what I need, and doing a clean out every Sunday so I get a sense of what I have or don’t have.
I also want to be cognizant of my composting and how I use scraps. Inspired by my chef friends, I’ve started a Ziploc bag filled with garlic skins, onion peels, parmesan rinds, and the odd stalk or two. This garbage is the perfect foundation for building a rich and flavourful stock. I’ve also started saving chicken bones and shrimp peels as well. I think there is a shrimp stock risotto in my future.
REDEFINE YOUR RELATIONSHIP TO MEAT
Growing up, I always assumed a meal wasn’t a meal until meat was a part of it. Whether it was a nice piece of steak, two juicy drumsticks, or a lovely duck breast a l’orange, I wouldn’t feel full until I had a good chunk of protein. I don’t think I can go fully vegetarian or vegan but I want to be more conscious of how I consume animal proteins. I want to challenge myself to have meals where vegetables play a major role and meat is that supportive best friend with fun quips. I also want to incorporate flavour techniques that bring a sense of meatiness to vegetables or legumes. Like adding liquid aminos in a veggie stir fry, making tofu a more prominent meat substitute, or swapping a piece of meat for some chickpeas. When I do buy meat, I also try my best to make sure that it's organic and additive-free. I’m also 2 weeks into experimenting with being pescatarian 3 times a week and it’s been great so far! Maybe I’ll try 3 times vegetarian down the line.
HELP OTHERS EAT WELL
Mohammed Ali famously said, “Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.” For myself and many of my friends, we are so blessed to never have to think about where our next meal will come from or do some financial gymnastics to ensure that our fridges are full. Yet for many others in our communities and our world, food insecurity is a daily reality that they have to confront.
I occasionally make donations to my food bank at Christmas and Thanksgiving or donate to a global food org around my birthday. I want to make my philanthropic contributions more recurring by setting up scheduled donations to a few organisations. I also want to start taking an afternoon or two each quarter to volunteer at a soup kitchen or shelter. It’s the least I can do but I think there is power in offering the little we have to support someone.
COOK FOR OTHERS
Cooking for one is boring! I make the most boring meals and I especially hate leftovers because most recipes are made with 4 people in mind. Although s/o Eric Kim for his Cooking for One column which brought some joy to solo cooking. There’s no greater joy for me than knowing that someone else can enjoy the fruits of my labour and experience comfort from my food. I guess there is a reason why I’m always the team cook on friend trips!
I’ve had this dream to go culinary school and spend summers staging at restaurants cooking at scale but I also feel like I want more practice cooking for large groups with less pressure. I really want to get into the hang of hosting supper clubs, having themed dinner parties, cooking with other eager friends, or maybe hosting cookbook clubs. I feel like it will help me get more practice in the kitchen, get better with recipe development and riffing, and also be a chance to tell stories via the plate! Watch this space for updates lol.
EAT OUT MORE
You’re probably wondering, “Isn’t this the one thing that you should do less of? Eating out is more expensive!!” Yes, all things are true but working in food media, eating out is part work and part play. I see eating out more as a chance to experience food in a comforting or exciting way. Chefs craft plates to tell stories, share experiences, and experiment with flavours and what a joy that we get to experience that in abundance. I also find eating out as a gateway to exploring new cuisines and bringing some of those flavours into your home. It’s how I discovered things that are core to my cooking now like gochujang, pickled daikon, or sambal goreng.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
I want to be more intentional about the media I consume, not just in food but in other parts of my life. We are so blessed to live in an age where we have access to food content and also from demographics that were not traditionally represented. Yet it can be overwhelming sometimes when it feels like you can never catch up. I want to be very intentional about the accounts I follow and whether they are displaying a healthy relationship with food or not. I also want to read more books on food writing, particularly commentary. I feel like I haven’t gotten to experience the full range of the works of legends like M.F.K Fisher, Bull Buford, Ruth Reichl Dr. Jessica B Harris and I also want to make way for new legends like Alicia Kennedy, J.Kenji Lopez-Alt, Klancy Miller, and more. Reading will make me a better writer, a more thoughtful consumer, and a happier eater! I also want to grow my cookbook shelf not just with new releases but with classics too. I’m limiting myself to purchasing ten this year so let’s see how that goes.
I would love to hear how you’re thinking about consuming food in 2024! Let me know in the comments. We will return to regularly scheduled recipes, riffs, recs, and more in the next few weeks. If there is anything that you would like me to talk about, lemme know!
Eat well and be well!
Your Friend in Food
Abena
Love how much you focus on approachable goals that you can implement in your everyday without the weight of “resolutions” on your shoulder! I’m always inspired by you, bb ♥️♥️♥️
these are phenomenal principles/themes - I'm inspired to steal some of these and make them a core part of how I think about food (and life) in 2024!