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Illustration by Jasmine Zhang
“Can you rinse the rice longer? Did you wash your hands?”
Do most mothers entertain these questions from their 21-year-old sons?
And yet, there I was, arduously rerinsing white sushi rice for “at least 30 seconds.”
I’d already washed my hands. Of course, I had.
“Yes, Chef,” I said.
After four years at university, my son returned home in April, rejoining the household while continuing his online studies. Having lived independently, he has developed a love for cooking, or, at least, a passion for his own, focusing on meals that involve meat, fat, starches, garlic, more garlic (“it’s very healthy”) and torturously hot spices. His brother loves these dinners. His father and I quietly add roasted broccoli and ratatouilles to the table, making us feel better about our dietary choices. Mostly, we’re happy that somebody else is making dinner and that it will be tasty.
At 21, I hadn’t yet lived on my own. My maternal grandma had moved in when I was four, and she and my mother commandeered the kitchen, concocting deliciousness. I knew to stay away. Far away. The one time they allowed me to make a family meal, a simple recipe from Home Economics that my teacher gamely called “Salmon a la King,” involving canned salmon, white bread, flour and Campbell’s cream of celery soup, my grandma was so ill that my mother renamed the dish “Salmonella King.” My kitchen banishment was ironclad – or mercury-clad for those who appreciate a little tinned fish humour.
I decided to do things differently with my children, encouraging them to use our entire home, including the kitchen. Maybe they’d grow up to love meal-making instead of fearing it as I had.
It worked. My youngest son is a whirling dervish during his culinary exploits. He’s meticulous about measurements, timing and ingredients, but our kitchen resembles an apocalypse after one of his sessions. When he washes his hands after handling chicken, he leaves puddles of water on the counter and floor. “Why do you wash your hands so – violently?” I ask.
“Efficiency, mom. I want them clean, but I need to get back to the pans ASAP.”
Yes, chef.
When my husband and I prepare meals, we clean as we go so that once we sit down to eat, there aren’t dirty pots, pans, bowls, implements and small appliances looming on the counters in our peripheral vision. Our sons prefer to accrue a mess. The stacks of unwashed things don’t negatively impact their dining enjoyment – only ours.
So, on a recent afternoon, to curb the chaos, I offered to act as sous-chef whilst my 21-year-old assiduously prepared “healthy” fried chicken thighs (“I’m using avocado oil, Mom”) and white rice with sesame seeds and crushed seaweed. The truth was that I also offered to help because it gave me an increasingly rare opportunity to be with my kid at a stage in his life when hanging out with your parents is no longer favoured.
After rinsing the rice for the correct amount of time, he directed me in various duties: “Please crack me a couple of eggs in a bowl? No, a bigger bowl.”
“Please stir the sugar and rice vinegar until there’s no sugar visible.”
This act took saintly patience, which I don’t typically possess.
“Please wash this dish. The cutting board? The other cutting board? This knife – I need this knife again, but it’s covered in raw chicken.”
After every request, I said, “Yes, Chef!”
I have watched and enjoyed three seasons of the TV series The Bear, and felt heartened that all the characters working in the restaurant refer to each other as “chef,” whether they’re on kitchen prep, service, maintenance or head chef duty. I love the “we’re all in this together” mentality and wanted it to echo in our kitchen. My son smirked after my third “Yes, Chef!” – or maybe he was trying to remove a speck of spitting hot avocado oil from his nose. I choose to believe I made him smile.
What began as a potentially tense role reversal evolved into a companionable employer/employee relationship. I kept the kitchen tidy-ish, and he concentrated on his cooking. I began anticipating his needs, “yes-cheffing” him as the preparation progressed. It hit me somewhere during our race to the finish line, otherwise known as 7 p.m. dinner, that every “Yes, chef!” I uttered was kitchen-speak for “I love you.”
Adult children, sons anyway, do not typically enjoy being gushed over by their mothers. The chance to tell my scruffy, dish-designing boy that I appreciate his skills and thoughtfulness and that I’m so happy he’s back home with his “original family” for as long as he decides to stay was intoxicating. I’ll offer to be his sous-chef whenever the opportunity presents itself.
Once the rest of our family sat down to eat, I told my son, “It all looks great, honey.”
Bent over a bowl, painstakingly raining seaweed bits into his rice with freshly washed fingers, he said quietly, “Thank you, chef.”
And that was all the nourishment this mother needed.
Robin Stone lives in Toronto.
