![]() ![]() But the flavor combinations, trinities of ingredients, worked superbly. My seasoning class was a simplification cuisines can’t really be reduced so perfectly. Food is hands-on, literal, and that’s something I adore about it-cook, savor, satisfy. When I taught students how to season food, I spoke in flavor trinities, never in metaphors. My husband, a lapsed Catholic, was never much interested in discussing church doctrine, but he speaks in metaphors, not my forte. Did she know I was out there, leaping toward the strong taste of meat, each meal a stepping-stone out? But waiting in my locker, her lunches supported me-especially sukiyaki after my birthday and brisket after Passover, laid onto rye bread with thinly sliced pickles.ĭecades later, I’m not sure if her meat was a mother’s love, but it felt like it. They made it so that I could walk with deliberation back to my classroom to face the shame of my subpar reading group, where I’d try to decipher the incomprehensible tangle of words on the page.īy high school, the rich aroma of leftovers in our bag lunches embarrassed my sisters. And after I ate them, the weight of her meaty sandwiches slowed me down. That ham pulled me away from that lunchroom smell, the roar of my classmates. ![]() I loved the dense white bread against the roof of my mouth, which always followed the sharp tang of the mustard and salty ham. How early on was it that I ate two? Because I asked for more, she complied. My sisters carried only one sandwich to that cement school. On a good day, I would uncurl my brown bag lunch and reach inside for a sandwich graced with her ham. It was meaty rather than slippery in texture, which made me strangely proud. Her company ham smelled bright and salty. Charred on the outside, bloody in its center, ready to be sliced ever so thinly, it beckoned. And when I was lucky, she’d have foil-wrapped flank steak waiting. Sometimes after school, it drove me home through the swampy woods. While I foraged the fridge for other delights, her meat got me through. ![]()
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