“Where’d Mom go?”
I heard my husband ask our daughter as he came out of the bedroom. I opened the study door and stepped out.
“I was writing.”
“Any eggs? What about apples? Are we out of apples?”
Still half asleep, my husband was groaning a little as he looked around for something to eat.
I used to leave boiled eggs and apples on the dining table before going to the cafe to write. But that morning, I had been writing in my husband’s study, planning to get him something to eat a little later. He had simply woken up before I expected.
“I’ll peel you an apple.”
I peeled and sliced an apple, put it on a plate, and took the one remaining boiled egg from the day before out of the fridge. I set it on the table with some salt. While I moved around the kitchen, my husband stood on the balcony looking out the window.
As he sat down to eat his apple, I put on my headphones and started listening to some upbeat music. I had stepped away from my writing and didn’t want to lose my flow.
I usually gave my husband two boiled eggs, and one didn’t seem quite enough.
I also thought my daughter and I could use something to eat. So I took some sliced bread from the freezer and made cinnamon toast.
“How many would you like?”
“Hm? Two… no, three.”
I gave my husband three pieces of toast and told my daughter to help herself if she wanted some.
I opened the bedroom window wide and went to get my laptop from my husband’s study.
“You can keep writing there,” my husband said.
“No, it’s okay.”
I took two pieces of toast to the desk in my bedroom.
I was slowly eating my toast while finishing my writing when my daughter came in.
“You’re still eating? I’ve already finished,” she said with a laugh.
“Already? I’m taking my time while I write.”
A little later, she came back and asked, “What’s for breakfast?”
“Hm? I don’t know. I’m almost finished with this piece, so I’ll make something once I’m done. I don’t want to stop in the middle. We already had some toast. Anyway…”
A short while later, I finished writing.
Feeling pleased, I got up, took a sheet mask from the fridge, and put it on my face. With my headphones on and upbeat music playing, I started moving around the kitchen.
First, I took out a container of baby greens and the last of the butterhead lettuce. I tossed them in a spicy, tangy dressing. The greens wouldn’t stay fresh much longer, so I used the whole container.
“I’m heading out,” my husband said as he left with his laptop bag.
“Are you making chive pancakes?”
My daughter came over to see what I was doing.
“Yeah. I felt like making some.”
I added some olive oil to a frying pan, dipped the chives into a simple flour batter seasoned with a little salt, and started cooking the pancakes while listening to music.
“Oh, it’s a party! A party!” my son said, watching me cook.
“Yeah. It feels good to move around. I might as well make everything we’re going to eat today while I’m at it.”
“Oh, so you’re only cooking once today.”
His comment made me laugh.
“Mom, you used to spend all day in the kitchen making food.”
About two months earlier, my son had said this to me while we were in the kitchen.
Until last year, I enjoyed spending my time that way. I thought food tasted best when it was freshly made. So I cooked something fresh for nearly every meal, two or three times a day.
In the quiet of the evening, I enjoyed listening to music while baking or making things that would keep for a long time, like plum syrup and kimchi. I loved getting completely absorbed in what I was doing.
A Different Rhythm
Last March, after creating my blog but spending so much time wondering whether to publish anything, I finally thought, Oh, I don’t know, and just hit the Publish button.
After that, I settled into a rhythm of publishing twice a week. Eventually, it became three times a week, and writing moved to the center of my daily life.
Naturally, I began spending more time writing and less time cooking.
“Try spending less time cooking,” my son said with a smile.
He suggested keeping food in the fridge so I wouldn’t have to cook every time someone wanted to eat. That way, I could spend less time in the kitchen.
That’s true. I wouldn’t have to cook for him whenever he ate at a different time, and he could just take out whatever he wanted whenever he felt like eating.
At first, figuring out what would still taste good after being kept in the fridge seemed like an extra hassle. But as I tried it, I discovered that some dishes still tasted delicious when reheated the next day.
I also began turning leftovers from the fridge into entirely different dishes.
One day, I sautéed some mushrooms and onions with just olive oil and salt. The next day, I added some Korean chili powder to the leftovers and quickly stir-fried them again. They had a delicious new flavor.
I also discovered something interesting with spicy vegetable japchae. When I reheated the leftovers in a dry frying pan with just a little oligosaccharide syrup and salt, the chewy texture of the day before became softer the next day. I enjoyed noticing these little changes.
Through these experiences, I learned that food didn’t always have to be freshly made to taste good.
Back to the Kitchen
“Do you like the music?” my son asked while tasting a piece of chive pancake dipped in a spicy, tangy chili sauce.
“Yeah. I even enjoy listening to AI-generated music.”
“Why don’t you make some AI music yourself, then?”
He laughed and went off to take a bath.
My daughter heated up a small pack of instant rice and ate it with the chive pancakes and seasoned greens.
“It’s so delicious,” she said with a smile.
I heated a small pack of instant rice for myself, too. The warm rice tasted surprisingly good with the seasoned greens on top. I ate some chive pancakes along with it, and after finishing about two-thirds of the rice, I put down my chopsticks.
“Oh, I’m full.”
I decided to make a batch of multigrain rice in the rice cooker, too. My husband might come home for dinner, and I didn’t want to cook rice later. Even if he didn’t, we could eat it tomorrow.
We had run out of oats, but there were some lentils left. I added a little of those and some black rice to the white rice and set the cooker going.
Then I remembered the enoki mushrooms in the fridge. The butcher had given them to me when I bought some pork, and I suddenly felt like making another pancake before they went bad.
I sliced up the last few shiitake mushrooms and an onion, then added them to the leftover batter from the chive pancakes along with the enoki mushrooms. I added a little more flour, water, and salt, and gently mixed everything together.
I added some olive oil to the frying pan, ladled in the mixture, and cooked the mushroom pancakes.
The sweetness of the onion, the rich flavor of the shiitake mushrooms, and the slightly chewy texture of the enoki mushrooms came together beautifully.
I finished the rest of my rice with a warm mushroom pancake.
“Wow, you made a lot. You were completely absorbed in it.”
My daughter came over and looked at everything I’d made.
“Yeah. It feels good to move around while listening to music. Yesterday, I even enjoyed driving on the highway for seven hours with music playing. I went to visit your sister, of course, but it almost felt like I was giving my old car a good workout,” I said with a laugh. “All the stiffness I felt this morning is gone.”
“That’s impressive.”
I laughed at her comment and looked at the clock. I seemed to have been moving around for about two and a half hours.
I tidied up a little and ran the dishwasher. I also filled and tied up a trash bag, leaving it for my husband to take out later.
“Are you going to take those out when you leave?” my daughter asked as she watched me transfer some plastic bottles into a recycling bag.
“Yeah. If I take a little out at a time, it doesn’t pile up.”
She carried the bag of plastic bottles and another bag of plastic wrappers to the front door.
My son came into the kitchen after his leisurely bath.
“Oh, you made something else, too. This is good. What are you going to do with the chicken in the fridge? Are you having that?”
“Yeah. I had a little taste earlier, and it was good even cold. I was thinking of heating it up for dinner. Do you want some? Shall I heat it up for you?”
“No, you have it, Mom. I’ll eat the pancakes.”
I put a cool sheet mask on my face and headed toward my bedroom.
“Okay, I’m going to lie down. They’re all vegetables, you know.”
“Nice!”
My son was happily enjoying the food as I picked up my phone to set my timer for fifteen minutes.
It was 2:30 in the afternoon.
Oh, I’ve already written a whole piece this morning, and I still have so much time left for myself. Haha.
