Dear Friends
I'm wishing you all a blessed year. A year with a difference. To those not yet married and to the married; I say may grace increase.
There is a saying which goes, “The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach”.
I have heard it several times and I interpreted it this way; because most men can’t cook, they will love and appreciate the women who
cooks for them. My understanding changed when I saw that my dad
cooked better than all of us in the house but still he would appreciate my mother's dishes.
I’m sitting down on the
couch after a long day, my son and I loves the food channel and he has a taste
for good food. There we are watching Jamie Oliver cooking and I’m saying to
myself, so how does his wife get to his heart?
Cooking is an opportunity to demonstrate love. It’s not about getting a degree in food science.
It’s not being the head chef at a five star hotel. It’s deeper than that; it’s an act of love. The demonstration of love in this simple and natural way is profound. I call it natural because eating is an every day business and I look at it as the best opportunity to show love.
I
grew up cooking food at home before I got married. In this process, I realized
that the best meal was the one that I put my heart, mind and energy to make
whether meat or vegetable. The family would always applaud that dish. This reveals
the other side of the story. Often we cook out of duty because we need to
eat so we must prepare a dish for the family. So cooking can turn out to be one of the duties we should do.
I reflect back in my family, my mother had a special plate to serve her husband and she had her ways of showing love using our traditional meals. For example, I remember how she made round nuts and ground nuts special for my dad. She would peel many and then select the best for him. It's only when I started writing my book, "Cooking is An Act of Love" that I reflected on the past and appreciating how it shaped my thinking.
Just the time that a
person spends on making sure the family eats breakfast, lunch and supper is
worthy of praise. When I was newly married, I enjoyed every moment I cooked for
my husband (Tinashe) because he really appreciated the effort.
I learned that within
the heart of an appreciated person dwells a spirit to do more. My cooking
skills have gone far beyond my expectations. Sometimes I ask myself,
if what I was making for my hubby when we got married was far less than the dishes
I make today in the home. Did he really mean it was good? The truth is that it
was good for that time. The appreciation I
receive from my family has made me grow from cooking other people's recipes to making my own
recipes.
In the next post we shall be sharing on tips to making a meal plan for visitors.
Blessings
Naomi
