At the beginning of Fergus Henderson’s book Nose to Tail Eating, before the contents and the introduction, is a page titled “Four things I should mention.” The first of these is about the idiosyncratic order of service at Sweetings, a fish and oyster bar in the heart of the City of London. The last one reads: “Do not be afraid of cooking, as your ingredients will know and misbehave. Enjoy your cooking and the food will behave; moreover, you will pass the pleasure on to those who eat it.”
Now, while I like both parts of this last bit of advice, I prefer the first part, which, far from feeling like a warning, is reassuring, especially when you consider that the word “afraid” is interchangeable with terms such as out-of-sorts, tired, grumpy and busy. It is also an amusing way to think about cooking, and my inevitably volatile relationship with a kitchen full of potatoes, lemons, eggs or bottles of cream that behave or misbehave, depending on the day, weather and any other number of variables.
