It was a Saturday morning, cold, bleak and cloudy, the only kind of weather Milan gets in November. I was on my weekly supermarket run, browsing the seemingly never-ending vegetable aisle. I try to make the most of all my supermarket trips: the food here is so much more vibrant and diverse than in Bucharest that I end up taking hours just because I like to gaze at all the options. The fragrant Sicilian tomatoes. The enormous parmigiano slices. The soft pieces of focaccia filling the air with their fragrant freshly baked steam.
As I was glancing around, I noticed a pack of vegetables sliced into cubes and wrapped neatly in plastic film labelled “Zuppa Toscana”. I had never made soup before, except for some packets of instant ramen on some occasional midnights during an exam session. Had I not known that my lover enjoyed soup, I would have probably never picked it up, but I thought it would be a nice surprise for him to have it. I imagined how excited he would be to eat some warm homemade soup and how maybe it would make his day a little better. So, with some blind confidence and a lot of hope, I placed the pack in my basket.
I often find myself wondering what the proper ingredients of a good relationship are. At times I used to think love feels like chamomile tea: warm and comforting, holding your soul in a soft, honey-glazed embrace. Yet at other moments, I could swear it was a zealous bite out of a scorching chilli pepper, filling my body with so much heat that it left me wondering whether trying it was a good idea in the first place. Unsurprisingly, it’s all about discovering the perfect balance of flavours and proportions for your dish — finding that delicate spot between an overwhelming explosion of taste and perpetual blandness. And just as with everything in life, it takes time, to complete such a tough investigation on flavour profiles. Of course, when we were together, my mind wasn’t focusing on this. There were days when sitting in silence with him in my bed or laying together in the sun and reading was enough to make me believe I had it all figured out. In my head, I was living the perfect life, with the perfect love story and just the right amount of spice on my plate. But there comes a time when you must realise that no amount of plain yoghurt will calm down the burn and accept that maybe you just can’t handle this much kick.
Later that day, I spent what felt like an eternity by the stovetop. First, I double-boiled the beans after leaving them to soak for an hour, just like my mom told me. I carefully cleaned some carrots, celery and onions, and added them to the pot, with the rest of the ingredients. A few drops of sweat were forming on my forehead as I was staring at the contents of my seemingly bottomless cauldron floating around in a hypnotic motion. I was doubting each and every one of my moves, but I wasn’t going to give up. Something inside me had ignited and I realised how content I felt at the thought of bringing happiness to someone through my own creation. After some more stirring, I sat for a while and waited.
It can be a real struggle to follow a recipe sometimes. At first glance, it may seem easy: you carefully follow all the steps in the right order for the right amount of time and you’re left with a culinary masterpiece. There are recipes out there even for the most unseasoned novices. But I was right in the middle of my project, with the instructions written in front of me and I still felt lost at sea. I had so many questions about everything, and it seemed like nothing I was doing was right. There were no instructions on what to do if I mistakenly put in too much salt or if some of the vegetables weren’t as soft as they should have been given how long I was cooking them. I wanted to look the author in the face and scream. The loneliness was getting increasingly hard to fight as I realised just how many things weren’t going the way they were supposed to and there wasn’t anyone who could fix them. The subtle sizzling of the salsiccia pieces in the pan was starting to sound harsh and somewhat patronising. I began questioning whether all of my effort was in vain, since everything I was doing was going unnoticed, and I felt like I was trying to make someone understand something they were simply not meant to understand.
He arrived at my place sometime in the evening. I couldn’t be bothered to check the time and had barely noticed that the sky had become dark. Thankfully, the soup was done. I drizzled some cream on top and hoped for the best. He sat down and I poured a couple of ladles into a bowl. I fell silent as I was tasting it and waited for him to say something. The soup was warm and hearty, not too heavy yet not too delicate. The pumpkin gave it a certain sweet earthiness that made each spoonful feel like a complete journey. He said it was one of the best soups he had ever had which made me blush. In that moment I was able to express my love for him and it seemed that he understood. It felt like I had laid a part of me on that table, speaking out my thoughts through flavours instead of words. The beauty of cooking for someone lies in how you choose to tell your story: a dish can show empathy, brighten up someone’s day, cure homesickness or even mend a broken heart. It’s about choosing to be vulnerable so as to make someone else feel cherished.
One night, he sat down in my bathtub and I washed his hair. I remember running my hands through his curls and thinking about all the love I had poured into the relationship. It’s truly a blessing to grow so close to someone that you know the sound of their breath like a morning prayer. I think of all the dinners we enjoyed throughout the time we were together and if I am ever going to get that feeling of purpose again as when I had someone to share my meals (and my breaths) with. Sometimes things don’t work out the way you’d expect. You might find yourself halfway through cooking lunch and realise that you need to throw everything away and start over. You curse under your breath, scoop up the bad ingredients and chuck them in the bin. For a few seconds you think of how the meal could have turned out if only everything was fine. Still, you gather yourself and try your best to begin from scratch, since you know you’ll starve if you don’t. Because what else is there to do but hope and try again?
