This story is not unique to me. I was working in a small restaurant near my apartment in Brooklyn last month before the metaphorical storm hit. We could feel the closure coming from a week away, even if the crowds didn’t dwindle until Saturday night. So it felt almost cathartic when it finally happened, and Governor Cuomo’s mandate made the decision for us. Or maybe it was the open wine we had to finish that night that felt cathartic. Either way, when my coworkers and I joined the legions of unemployed and ate our last family meal together, nursing hangovers, there was a fragile feeling in the air that was familial, surreal, and deeply kind.
The physical manifestation of that kindness was the boxes of food we each took home. Some of it was leftovers from the walk-in, menu overflow that would never make it to a guest’s plate. Some of it had been ordered in bulk for just this purpose - using the communal purchasing power of our staff to send everyone off with groceries for a week. By the time I got home, proudly displaying my haul to my partner, our already full pantry was now overflowing with items new and old and demanding attention. I spent 5 hours sorting and cataloging like it was my new job, diligently recording the forgotten remnants of recipes past and enforcing first-in-first-out order in our tiny kitchen. Those five hours worked wonders to soothe my anxiety, even as they raised questions about what we had been doing until then. When did we end up with three kinds of miso? How old did we let this tomato paste get? Is this freekeh or bulgur or barley and what is each of those things exactly? Why are there 2 open boxes of cornstarch? And, crucially, why do none of the tupperware have lids?
I think for many of us - faced with the prospect of two weeks without a trip to the grocery store - the pantry has taken on some slightly mythical significance. In the early days of the crisis, I saw at least 3 articles on how to stock up, and another 6 on what to do with all that tuna fish once you had it. Here lies self-sufficiency, creativity, and control! It isn’t hoarding if you use that flour, and finally learn to bake bread. I felt that surge of positivity too; we were stocked. We were prepared. This could be exciting.
But vague good vibes do little to help use up your (3 kinds of) miso, so I came up with a plan to harness that energy. My partner and I would take turns making dinner each night, and at the end of each meal the cook would challenge the other with one ingredient that had to be used the next day. Simple, time-tested, and Iron Chef-approved.
We had already established a pattern of switching meal duty, since we are fortunate enough to both be reasonably good cooks but unfortunate enough to be completely incompatible in the kitchen. My partner is methodical - he treats cooking as a science, begins with a recipe and iterates (changing a single variable each time). He does everything from making coffee to baking bread with an easy-going precision that I envy. He starts with a mise en place and does dishes as he goes!
I, on the other hand, am a mess. A lightning rod for entropy. I use every bowl we own and snack the entire time. I cannot be trusted without an apron and often cannot be trusted with one either.
Since we already knew that a turn-based system worked best, it was easy to add this element of challenge. My partner gave me a 6-month old jar of harissa, I used it in a beet salad (day 13). I pulled out some forgotten lemongrass stalks, and he blended them into a curry (day 8). I am not sure my panzanella did justice to our crusty bread (day 5), but I’m very proud of my stuffed peppers with avocado lime crema (day 27). I even came close to an instagram post when he upped the ante with asparagus tempura (day 12) before deciding no filters did it justice. We did send pictures to friends to brag, and began diligently keeping a log of each night.
Each week, we take a strange masked trip to the grocery store to get fresh produce, but our shopping is fundamentally different. The stakes are higher - we can’t forget something essential - but the planning is gone. We grab what looks good (and plentiful). We know by heart the things we each can’t live without, or use obsessively. Garlic, chickpeas, rice vinegar. I swear by black sesame seeds, and he needs plenty of red pepper flakes.
It was not until I was tossing leftovers into mushroom fried rice (day 15) that I considered how important this ritual had become to me. It had been a so-so day, beautiful outside (which under quarantine feels almost like an insult), but frustrating and dull within our small space. He suggested simply making some pasta with pesto, the unquestionable favorite dish in our household, but I bristled at the idea of having a repeat on the list, or - even worse - skipping a day's entry. So I made mushroom fried rice instead; something easy but novel. I felt palpable relief recording it in my journal.
I am aware that this is not sustainable forever. We will eventually run out of new corners in the pantry to explore, or crave some prior hit. There is a point when even healthy habits become impractical compulsions, and I don’t know yet whether that will happen before or after the world reopens. But the list gives me something I could not for a long time identify - a feeling that these days are not lost, even if I can no longer tell a Monday from a Thursday. Each one is unique, and I have proof of it: a catalogue of experiences worth having after hours spent checking the news, checking my bank account, mimicking productivity and sinking into guilt over the novel I haven’t written.
My therapist would call this magical thinking (if I hadn’t indefinitely cancelled therapy, a luxury for more flush times): the underlying belief that something has more significance and impact than it does. Maybe even that it can give the weeks meaning outside these four walls. See world? Days are passing! This cannot last forever and we haven’t lost this time. Though I know that texting my mother for her old recipe to use up lentils (day 19) does nothing to keep her healthy, it still means we are 24 hours closer to the end. And my list, 34 days long, means that 34 days of uncertainty and isolation are behind us, with something tangible to show for them. I may not be able to count the lives saved while we stay inside, but I can count the meals cooked.
I think that when the end is truly in sight - when we can return to whatever remains of our favorite restaurants, see the occasional stranger’s maskless smile, and listen to each other’s stories of loss and grief without being blinded by worry for ourselves - I will invite everyone I can over for a huge pot of pasta with pesto. And then I will eat leftovers for days.