What I Eat, Part 1

But first: my cooking history, with all its many types of shame

I’ve never been one of those women who cooks magnificently, with beautiful tableware and the proper amount of serving spoons. You can’t do everything and I decided that in this life I would take a pass on cooking, figuring we had done enough of that. I got by with my few staples, burning tofu and eggs and beans and rice and lots of kale and avocadoes thrown in for health.

When I got married I joined forces with another person who didn’t really cook and he added so-so burritos to the repertoire. I did bake — pumpkin pies, almond cookies, date carrot muffins, olive oil cake — to satisfy my own sweet tooth, and over the years I became pretty good at altering recipes to make them grain-free, refined sugar-free and high in protein. I also felt desserts gave you more bang for your buck, since you could bring it out at a dinner party and everyone would go Oooo! like excited kids and then you could explain all the substitutions, how it wasn’t even really bad for you and some people would get genuinely excited and other people would look at the ceiling like God why did I move to LA?