The Essentials

Bread is a cross cultural staple of cuisine. In many long forgotten languages, the first words rediscovered are ‘bread’ and ‘water’. From the dawn of humankind, bread has brought communities together (ex: the idiom ‘breaking bread’). Yesterday, I joined in this ancient tradition of bread and company. My friend brought over his bread recipe, already rising, and I got to work on mine in my tiny dorm kitchen. As we cooked on the stovetop, we traded off responsibilities of turning, mixing, getting ingredients. In just one short hour, a steady flow of faces came and went, making their respective meals (steamed bao, pasta, matzo pizza, instant ramen). We learned to share the four burners and limited instruments and containers. We rolled our dough with a found and anonymously owned sweet potato, splashed water in glasses and declared them “clean enough” while music and television blended with our voices. Once the bread and topping had been prepared, we gathered around my small computer screen to share a laugh over  ‘Brooklyn 99’, grabbing mismatched chairs and a piano bench. For the first time in a long while, I felt like we were whole together, finally on the same wavelength. I got so much more out of that dinner than a good meal. Sure, it took some planning and its fair share of missed opportunities and miscommunications, but it was worth it. The connection that comes from making and sharing a meal with the people you love, to use your talents to benefit the group in a tactile way is priceless.