I stand in the kitchen. My feet bare against the cool tile floor. The windows are opened wide, and a subtle breeze skims my skin with every sporadic movement of the wind. I remove the lid and the steam meets my face; my nostrils flare wide. I bring the soiled spoon to my lips to taste. Acid from the tomatoes. Fat and salt from the blend of beef and pork. Sofrito that has been cooked down to nothing and everything. The complexity of the wine that hasn’t fully cooked off yet.

I’ve been standing in this kitchen for 5 hours, slowly stirring. Gently swaying to the earthy rhythm of bossa nova while watching my dough rise before shaping it in my big, strong hands and rolling it out in long, careful gestures. The sneaky dusting of flour on every surface. The elegance of a french rolling pin. My weekends are often spent right here making things from scratch. Discovering new techniques and things about myself I never knew the previous day. I read. I study. I watch videos, but it’s not the same when you’re standing barefoot in the kitchen and let your instincts take over. Adding spices because it feels good, and because you have a longstanding love affair with a little heat. When you decide on different herbs simply because they make you smile that day. Adding the extra hunk of butter. Subbing water for stock or that dry cabernet. Always the extra garlic. Always.

I love to tell people that cooking for others is my love language. And it’s true, I promise. But the first love I nourish each day is my own. I don’t need a full Sunday. Every day is a celebration of life - and love - through eggs, through potatoes, through roasted vegetables, freshly baked bread, and ripe blackberries to sweeten the palette with dessert. Every day I write a love letter to myself, or if I’m lucky, to the friends and family who make it to my table. We sit in a circle with knife and fork and feed our bodies with everything we didn’t know we needed, and everything we did.