# thecook: a story about learning to ignore people
i love my mom's fried chicken with fries! i want to cook my own. i know! i will become a chef and prepare fried chicken with fries all day long!
alright, let me start immediately. the book says i need batter, oil, chicken, potatoes. potatoes must be fried for a while so let me start cutting that! ouch i cut my finger and there is blood everywhere. no matter, i apply a bandage a keep cutting. i now put the potatoes into the fryer and off it goes. i prepare the batter, cut the chicken fillets, coat them with batter, and start frying them too. oh, the fries are ready. let me take them out of the fryer, and pour them onto a plate. i salt them too. what is this smoke i smell? oh god, the chicken is on fire! i did not set the gas stove correctly and it started burning while i was preoccupied with the fries. quick let me put out the fire. i grab a 0.5 liter glass, fill it with water and pour it onto the frying pan.
my first attempt did not go well. at least i can do my next attempt in a new kitchen. before doing that i decide to learn about this cooking more. i read books, watch cooking shows and so on. one of the common advice i have seen is "separation of concerns". it says that i should not try to do too many things at the same time because i will be overloaded and i will not be able to follow what is going on. that sounds reasonable.
okay, so now i have some experience: both practical and theoretical. let me try this again. this time i do the chicken frying first. i prepare the batter, cut the chicken fillets, coat them with batter, and start frying them. as i am frying i watch the stove, adjust the settings. the chickens now seem the right color so i take them out the fryer. my fried chicken is ready! now i can do the fries. i start cleaning so that there is nothing else on my working table that could distract me. i cut the potatoes. no finger cutting this time. i fry them too. i wait, i take them out, and pour them onto a plate. yay, i am done, this will be awesome. i serve both my chicken and fries onto a plate and start eating. ugh. the chicken is cold.
not too bad but i see there is more to learn in the world. so i study more. i even attend a culinary course. they show me fancy tools and methods to follow. i learn to be more efficient. there is not much benefit of cutting my own fries. i can buy it frozen and it will be roughly the same. i can buy pre-battered fries. and if i am very careful i can fry both of them at the same. i still need to separate the concerns so i make sure that i fry in the opposite corners of the kitchen so that i do not accidentally mix up the two. feels a bit weird but sounds totally reasonable. after the frying is done, i serve the meal and everything is fine! i can finally enjoy the fruits of my studies.
it is time for me to enter the big world. i start working at a big company among many other chefs. we all prepare fried chicken and chips all day long together. i learn lot from my colleagues. they even show me more advanced tools and methods. i can now prepare this meal even more efficiently. i can see other people also enjoying all the chicken and fries. life is wonderful.
time goes on. i feel a change in myself. something is not right. there is no excitement anymore. is it because i do not like chicken and fries? no, that is not it. i clearly like it still. then how come i do not want to do this all day long? where did all the feeling of fulfillment from cooking go?
i start looking. i look at the cooking shows. they are all the same, do not create any change in me and they seem boring. then one of the shows catches my eyes. it has a special guest cook. a well renowned one. it piqued my interest because this person seemed to be full of positive energy. it turns out people find his meals masterpieces. yet people hate his guts for a reason still unclear to me. i watch his cooking. then watch other people's reaction to his meal. i feel excited again simply by watching him. but why? what is he doing differently? i watch closely. after many hours analyzing the footage i distill two observations. first he is like a barbarian. does not use most modern tools he could use. he is not using the robopeeler, nor the robocutter for his potatoes, he does all that by hand. this is silly but oh well. after the judges start eating his meal, he continues to make adjustments and suggestions how to consume the meal! he asks questions, suggests using a little bit of salt here, a little bit of mustard there. he is quite eccentric. it went against everything i learned: using tools and that my job ends when i serve the food. it is odd but i want to be like him.
okay, but not use tools? this is silly but well, let me try it. this is painful. i am cutting my potato and i just cut my finger again. i am frying my chicken from my own batter without a timer and i overcooked it a bit again. and the taste is quite meh. and my kitchen is a mess again. i have to clean it. but this is odd. i feel calmness. i actually feel good now. i made the overcooked chicken myself. i made it with my own hands. i did not need help from the robots. it was me who put that chicken there. without me that overcooked chicken would have been some other generic fried chicken again. i had a deep connection with that chicken. this is fun!
the next day i do this again. this time i feel like i should go eccentric even more and use crisps instead of breadcrumbs in the batter. this time i did not cut my finger nor overcook my chicken. the chicken was really special, extra crunchy. it was awesome! how come this is not the normal way to cook this? i tell about this to some people and i get crazy looks. they never even bother to try it. am i just imagining that this is that good? i continue experimenting with various other tweaks. some work, some do not but i find a lot of joy in the process.
so far all i did is the do stuff by hand. i want to try the second observation i have noticed. the part where i actually serve my meal to others and see them consume it. but where could i do this? i know! at my company!
i go to my coworkers and ask if they would mind if, when nobody is around, i would use the kitchen to create a small dish for a few interested folks after work hours. they say nice idea, go ahead. i am happy. i decide to create something special that i cannot create at home because i lack a special ingredient available only at work: cheese. so instead of fried chicken, i want to create fried cheese. people still like the idea.
one of the company policies that whenever someone is in the kitchen, they must have a coworker there for safety reasons. the coworker buddy is ought to stop that someone from doing bad stuff and help out if accidents happen. there is a guy i know who is really interested in all this cooking, i talk with him a lot about cooking, i think he will be ideal as my buddy. i warn him i will be a bit unconventional and then grab a potato and start peeling by hand. he immediately stops me. i am doing this wrong. i should be using the robopeeler, have i gone mad? i explain that this is really important. we start arguing about this. we keep arguing until i actually manage to manually peel and cut the potatoes. i start frying them. he is quite disappointed in me by this time. then i start frying the chicken as well. he goes insane when he noticed that i did not start the timer. "frying without the timer is bad! it is very hard to know how long to cook without the timer. and besides, it is company policy to always use the timer!". then he grabs my frying pan, throws out my cheese out of it and gets his own battered cheese, starts frying it but also starts the timer. "see? this is how it is done.".
on one hand he is correct. that is how this thing should be done. on the other hand he managed to completely kill my mood and interest in this food. it should not matter to me if the timer is going on for my chicken yet it does. simply the timer being there annoys me. i do not get the "i made this without robohelp" feeling anymore. i am getting back to the "this is no fun, this is just plain work" state. what also annoys me that he also tells me how to do *my* stuff even though he is completely uninterested in the end product, only in the cooking process itself. i try to to explain that this is part of the magic i need in order to make this meal but he does not budge. i get angry, do a super quick cleanup and leave the kitchen because i do not see any point in continuing.
i keep thinking about the next step. i could leave the whole thing and just not try make an interesting meal for a few folks. however i cannot let one person get to me. i think i just need to change my buddy. there is this other guy. he is pretty busy all the time just because he actually gets work done in the company. he does not have time for petty arguments. but i will not get any feedback or suggestions from him either. i ask him to be my buddy and he comes. as expected, he does not give much attention to me, he is doing his own job. on the other hand i can finish my meal in the way i want. my guests come. i do not tell them how i made this food other than it was a labour of love. i do not want them to run away from me when they learn that i hand peeled and hand cut my potatoes as in all the previous cases. i sit down next to the people who will consume it. they like it. i feel happy about this. i recommend some salt here, some mayonnaise there. i feel the fulfillment again.
people started liking what i create but at the same time people started hating my guts. i am no longer pleasing all the people but in exchange i feel fulfillment in my life again. i accept this tradeoff. all i need is to have the courage to be disliked.
published on 2019-02-28