When New York Times food writer Kim Severson tweeted a few weeks ago that she would be leaving New York City in order to take over as the Times’ bureau chief in Atlanta, my first reaction was: “Kim in the South, how great is that?” I then realized that food writing probably wouldn't be her primary focus in her new gig. Bummed, to say the least.
No secret here that I love everything about food. I love cooking it, plating it, looking at it, smelling it, touching it, reading about it. And, through the wonders of personal blogging, I even make a quarter-assed attempt at writing about it. I got all teary the evening I listened to Virginia Willis read the introduction to her stellar cookbook, Bon Appétit, Y’all (I also had her Georgia Peach Soufflé in my belly, so I was rather emotional to start), and, well, we’ve already spoken of my feelings for John T. Edge. I’m most drawn to food writers who aren’t elitist about it, the ones who write about roadside stands and barbecue joints and the history and emotion hidden in a plate of food. When these folks do write about the restaurants that most of us will never have the means to experience, they do it with a charm and style that never comes across as snotty. This, to me, is Kim Severson. Her dispatches on subjects as varied as watermelons in Arkansas and ham hocks in Brooklyn, as well as elegantly crafted profiles on chefs like Thomas Keller and Leah Chase, will be missed.
Severson has recently published a memoir about her adventures in the food trade, Spoon Fed: How Eight Cooks Saved My Life (Riverhead Books, 2010), and her aforementioned tweet reminded me that it was still sitting on my “To Read” list.
Let me start by saying that when she tells us that these eight cooks “saved her life,” she’s not being glib. Severson walks us through her encounters in the kitchens of eight women (or, in the case of Alice Waters, Severson’s own kitchen in Brooklyn where Waters makes lunch), all of whom have a valuable lesson to share as she overcomes her own personal struggles with alcohol, failed relationships, and a withering lack of self-confidence.
As I read on through Severson’s accounts of lunches with Ruth Reichl and quiet moments with Edna Lewis, I couldn’t help but think of my dear friend Robyn. Robyn is a kind Mother Earth-sort who moves through her house trailed by a menagerie of devoted animals, a woman who hugs you like you’re the one person she’s been waiting all day to see, a woman whose osso bucco will make you cry, I promise, from the first bite to the last. When she invites you into her home and cooks for you, you know she loves you. She’s the cook I someday hope to be. And to those of you who covet my polenta, here’s my confession: Robyn taught me how to make it.
I had a very rough go of it for a span of about a year, for reasons that are thankfully now in the past. Much of it is a blur these days, but I do recall the one thing that would pull me out and make me feel somewhat close to human again was, of course, food. I sought this distraction any way I could, and I can tell you that a five-Saturday baking “boot camp” at the Culinary Institute of Charleston proved to be quite the salvation. On the first or second Saturday, I scorched a small but blistering burn on the top of my hand with molten chocolate. As I soothed my hand under the cool tap, I realized yep, that’s gonna leave a mark. I was ecstatic. A war wound. MY war wound. The burn itself should come as no shock to anyone who has seen me cook, but that wasn’t the point. It was my first burn in a culinary school kitchen, and probably the first time I’d smiled in a month.
I walked into Robyn’s kitchen that afternoon with a box full of chocolaty goodness and showed her my hand. “Look, look! I created something wonderful and here’s the wound to prove it!” She got it; she always does. She understood exactly why that burn meant so much to me. Food saves people, it really is that simple, and she helped me remember exactly why.