Soup for the Sick or the Soul?

 General, Personal Stories  1 Response »
Feb 172006
 

I’ve been thinking about chicken noodle soup. I’ve been thinking about the excellent home-made chicken stock in my freezer, the vegetables in my crisper, the half a grilled chicken breast in my fridge, and the open package of fettuccine in my cupboard. I’ve been thinking that I have all the ingredients for chicken noodle soup, which supposedly has restorative value when you’re sick with a cold or the flu. Now, if only I could pull myself off the couch and out from under this blanket, and muster up enough energy to stand for about 20 minutes, I might just make some.

The story unfolds like this. I found myself in the middle of a Nor’Easter (I always feel like a sailor when I say that), which would eventually dump twelve inches of snow on Philadelphia. Simultaneously, my dear, sweet, loving and adorable pooch had an upset stomach. Between the hours of 11pm and 5am, sweet Sadie whined and cried from two stories down, begging me to please open the front door to let her out. Not once… but four times, I made the urgent leap out of bed and down two flights of stairs, opened the front door for Sadie, and plunged forth into the blizzard wearing my pajamas. After all, I know she would do the same for me, if only she had thumbs and could manage the door handle.

The next day was a battle between me and the weather. I’m not sure, but I suspect the world would have stopped turning had I not made it into work, so for everyone’s sake, I fought the elements and took the train out to the suburbs. I waited in the blowing snow for 30 minutes at the other end of the line for a ride the rest of the way to the studio. Later, after work, I was dropped off at the train station and waited outside for another 40 minutes for the return ride home. The train stopped at the station before mine, and didn’t seem to want to move any farther. I got out and walked the distance. I had to get home to my sick dog. What havoc would she have wrecked on my home in my absence, not able to open the door herself?

Over the next two days, Sadie’s health improved while mine quickly deteriorated. She was lethargic for a day, but soon tried to eat the mailman again – a sign that she is back to normal. Meanwhile, I moved myself down to the couch and crawled under a blanket. Frankly, even typing on the computer seemed to require too much energy. That’s when I started thinking about chicken noodle soup.

I honestly can’t remember if my mother made chicken noodle soup for me when I was sick as a child. I know that I don’t particularly like chicken noodle soup, which is a good indication that I did have it when I was ill, for I have developed bad associations with foods and drink that were used as restorative nutrients. To this day, ginger ale will bring on cold and flu symptoms faster than any virus I’ve encountered. In keeping to this theory, there’s a good chance that chicken noodle soup was on the list of “sick foods”. When I finally made it out of the house and to the grocery store, I stood in the soup aisle for about 15 minutes, staring at all the different chicken noodle soup options. I couldn’t bring myself to pick up any of them. I mean, truly, I didn’t even touch a can or package to look at it more closely. The soup simply held no appeal. Instead, I chose an organic tomato soup.

So, why then, do I still have chicken noodle soup on the brain? Is it because all my ingredients are sitting in the kitchen, practically begging to be put together? Is it time for me to give chicken noodle soup another chance? Are there really restorative qualities in this concoction given to sick children world-wide? I decided to find out.

It didn’t take me long to discover that this question has been posed by many over the years. Indeed, there have even been a few medical studies on the subject, but none have been very thorough since there’s no monetary incentive – no-one will be able to patent chicken noodle soup and become a millionaire. What I did find out was that most “experts” agreed that the steam inhaled when eating a hot soup aids in unclogging congestion. No kidding. Big deal. Mum made me lean over a bowl of boiling water with a towel over my head to ease my congestion. That’s not why she would have made me eat chicken noodle soup.

Then I read other less-agreed-upon theories on why chicken noodle soup is good for more than just your soul. Some think that there’s an amino acid released when chicken is cooked that aids in reducing inflammation and slows mucus production – a common problem with the common cold. Others maintain that the fat content of chicken noodle soup helps soothe your sore throat. The most in-depth study, by a Dr. Rennard who used his wife’s Lithuanian mother’s recipe in his research, asserts that it stops neutrophils (inflammatory white blood cells) from accumulating in your bronchial tubes.

As I read and learned more, chicken noodle soup started to hold even less appeal. I lay on the couch, thinking about mucus, inflammation, Kleenex, bronchial tubes, chicken fat, amino acids, over-cooked carrots, slippery noodles sliding down my throat, where I was pretty sure a golf ball was lodged at the moment. My distaste for chicken noodle soup was just getting worse.

I then had a sudden revelation. I realized what had been left out of the scientific research. I’m quite sure that in no case study were the patients required to make their own chicken noodle soup. I’m sure it was made for them. Perhaps even made for them by a Lithuanian grandmother! It was the fact that the soup was prepared for them, and the love and care involved in that process that really held the healing power. I snuggled down deeper under my blanket, knowing that there was no longer any reason to move off the couch and into the kitchen. Sure, I had all the ingredients for chicken noodle soup in my home, but I was missing the key component – the person to make it for me.

I never really liked chicken noodle soup anyway, and I’m already feeling much better.

Organized Child

 Personal Stories, Techniques  No Responses »
Feb 022006
 

I am told that as a child, I would go grocery shopping with my mother and “tidy up” the store while she shopped. I would return misplaced or abandoned items to their rightful homes and make sure that all the labels were facing outwards for the customer to see properly. Had my mother been a little more entrepreneurial, she might have rented me out, for there are companies who actually pay people to do such work for their product, and clearly, I had talent. Instead, she just kept moving up and down the aisles while I made sure that everything in her wake was in order.

I’m quite sure this little childhood story comes as no surprise to those who know me now. Given my somewhat “overly organized” personality, it is entirely believable. I can live in someone else’s mess for a little while, but in my own world, I like things to be where they are supposed to be. After all, if whatever you’re looking for is in the right place, it is easier to take the next step in doing whatever you happen to be doing that involves whatever it is you’re looking for, no? For instance, if your keys are on the hook right near the door, it is easier to leave the house and lock the door behind you – you don’t need to stop and spend time looking for your keys.

In my overly organized fashion, I like to apply this concept to almost every aspect of my life, and cooking is no exception. Indeed, when cooking professionally on a line, organization is critical. Without structure, the whole kitchen would fall apart. The restaurant line is only as good as its weakest link, and with emotions as raw as they can be in a restaurant kitchen, you do not want to be the weakest link.

At home, preparing the evening meal is usually a solo performance. In most cases there’s no-one else working with you, relying on your effort in order to pull the meal together. Consequently, the home cook should feel a little more relaxed. Why then, do so many people feel stressed out about making dinner, especially when entertaining? The most common answer to this is timing. The home cook has to prepare all parts of a meal themselves, and needs to time those different components to be ready simultaneously. Therein lies the challenge. But more than that, the home cook wants all parts of the meal finished pronto, with no time put into them at all.

So, how can one make timing the meal easier and reduce the stress on the cook? I’d like to argue that being organized is the first step. Mise en place is something that every professional, and many home cooks, understand. It translates from French as “to put in place”, and refers to doing all your preparatory work before actually cooking – chopping what needs chopping, measuring what needs measuring, etc… It is a standard procedure in restaurants and commercial food settings, and for years has been something that I’ve preached to the home cook. Why? Well, it prepares you to cook, prevents last minute rushing and panicking, and facilitates timing parts of the meal. It simply makes the cooking process so much more enjoyable. At least… that’s what I think. But then, I enjoy cooking in general, and as previously stated, I thrive on organization.

But what about all those people for whom cooking at night is a chore, a burden? What about those people who like to fly by the seat of their pants and just get a meal on the table? Will doing their mise en place before they cook help them, relieve them of stress and allow them to enjoy the process? Having given this some thought, I think that unfortunately mise en place will only frustrate and add to their nightly burden, for despite the fact that the ingredients prepared for a meal can look delightful in little bowls or even little piles on a cutting board, the big drawback is that preparing mise en place definitely takes time. It is hard for me to accept this. It is difficult to think that not everyone in the world enjoys food preparation and eating the way I do.

In her latest cookbook, Sara’s Secrets for Weeknight Meals, Sara Moulton touches on this subject. In her introduction, she describes her disappointment in learning that most people these days seem to want to prepare dinner in fifteen minutes or less. “Fifteen minutes?!” she writes, “What’s the big rush? Cooking is fun. Cooking is therapeutic. Cooking is creative. Cooking concludes with a wonderful meal that brings the whole family together.” Still, she succumbs to her readers. This cookbook is a good compromise between someone who is truly a cook at heart, and the general hungry public. She provides 200 recipes that will satisfy your culinary creativity, but can be completed in thirty to forty-five minutes. In order to accomplish this, she’s done away with the concept of mise en place.

“Technique–wise, I’ve dispensed with what the French called mise en place … That’s a smart way to go for a restaurant chef, who has to cook hundreds of dishes to order on any given night. But it’s definitely not the fastest plan for a home cook, who can certainly wait to chop up the garlic and peppers while the onions are browning.”

Reluctantly, I guess I have to agree with Sara, but I’m not happy about it. I don’t want to get off my mise en place soap box. I often find the preparation of ingredients as enjoyable as the actual cooking, but I do understand that not everyone has the luxury of the time it takes to do this, and many would probably rather be watching Law & Order. AND, I have to shyly admit that I too, usually do my mise en place in stages, so as to be as efficient as possible (there’s that overly organized part of me again!). I’ll concur that on a weeknight, when cooking for the family, mise en place is probably not necessary, but I will remain true to the premise that if you want to reduce stress and facilitate timing when entertaining, advance preparation is essential and will ease your tension.

Having softened on my quest for universal kitchen readiness, I’ve created a compromise of my own. I’ve decided that I will now consider my pantry, my refrigerator, my overall food inventory, to be my mise en place. After all, if my cupboards are in order, and I know what lies behind their doors, I’m prepared to not only cook my meal, but do my grocery shopping, AND it leaves room for more creativity, knowing what is there to throw into a meal at the last minute. Not only that, but now I can browse through my pantry and return misplaced or abandoned items to their rightful homes and make sure that all the labels are facing outwards. You see how this works? Now I can satisfy not only my overly organized personality, but the child inside as well.