Your favorite dish should be one you have often

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy

“Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,” so says Polonius to his son Laertes in Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

kales

Any man must have at some point been asked, “what is your favorite dish?”, or, if he never has been, he must have proclaimed it unsolicited. Yet it is only now that it has become clear to me how foolishly, so far, I have been answering the question about my favorite meal. The discussion in the past has mostly run along the lines of:

“Henry, tell me, what’s your favorite meal?”
“Well, I love good food.”
“What kind of good food do you love?”
“I don’t know, I think I like chicken. Or fish?”

I am Kenyan, and like most kids, I have been raised in a family where the nomenclature isn’t so varied when we think about food. I am always bogged down by all the names of food that people, of a higher class, I presume, eat. What of all the ingredients they use to prepare them! I didn’t know of salads and desserts until after I was in high school, the knowledge only being helpful for my creative writing. Or, whenever I thought of dessert, it usually had something to do with how differently it is pronounced from desert, while taking into account whether ‘desert’ was in that case, a noun, or a verb. I am yet to taste pizza.

As I was the firstborn child, my culinary skills got shaped up, without it mattering that I was male, while I was yet very little— I will confirm the exact age from my mom. I am sure it didn’t it make me any bit effeminate, for if anything, I have over time developed an aversion to cooking, and would rather do something else, despite my not being bad at it. I, however, intend only to say that in my earlier years, had I thought of preparing beef stew, I would not have thought of anything beyond salt, tomatoes, and onions. Oh! and cooking oil, if the meat didn’t have so much fat. If it went further, maybe coriander, or royco as the seasoning agent (I don’t know if I should say powder?) That has since been altered on account of, I think, my seeing the world, and meeting new people who happen to be respected for their soup-preparing abilities. In fact, were it not that I just likely might end up marrying a Kikuyu lady, I almost ended up hating the whole tribe for their insisting that they include irish potatoes in nearly every meal they were preparing, mostly beef stew. Now, why would someone ruin so good a stew by adding waru?¹ It’s only its being laughable that makes it tolerable, for otherwise it’s depressing when you finally confirm such stereotypes.

I am a bit broken knowing that it’s mostly my fellow country men, and comrades, who will make out the most sense from that rather unsophisticated discussion about dishes. I, however, hope the lesson I now draw from it won’t be so much alienating.

So, what’s your favorite meal, Henry?

Responding to the question, I have almost always very quickly, and easily, spoken of my love for chicken and fish. Chicken, or fish, are however not meals I have frequently. Put differently, they are to me, quite uncommon dishes. It is usually after a long while, months even, that have almost lapsed into whole years, that I have beef for my supper.

Quite obviously, considering the great number of people who sleep hungry for not having anything to eat, complaining of my being unable to eat such dishes should really be besides the point. I mean, instead, to lament my being so fast to name as a favorite, something I but only can lay my hands on just once in a while. How soon did I forget that if you were to meet me at noon, I would most probably have a little bag of chopped sukuma-wiki² clasped in my hand.

One of the causes of the frustration in our lives might be our falling in love with things that do not belong to us. So easily indeed do we adore things that are not ours. If it is kales in fact that I take more often, why then do I, when asked what my favorite meal is, want to name something else? In this aspect at least there’s much wrong in the idea of wanting to fake it until we make it. Why do I have to watch videos of meals I could never prepare myself? Won’t it be better that after watching a chicken being grilled, I can go buy my own, and do likewise?

Flying cannot be my favorite means of transport when on most days I walk to school and back home on foot. Why admire people’s cars, or have a brand I can name as my best, and dearest, when I have never driven any? No, I am not allowed to love things that I do not own. So you see that food isn’t really the point here? Contentment is, and as Brianna Wiest aptly puts it: we are only worthy of the things we are grateful for.

Very often indeed we don’t look into our hands to see what we have there. Nor do we look at our dishes and be glad that something is in fact there, instead our eyes wander to other people’s plates, and very soon we think, “he has more than I do”, even when it is we who did the serving.

The comparison made possible by social media hurts us, for we see people’s beautifully curated lives, and desire it for ourselves. Why would you be satisfied with your own life when there’s the possibility of so much more?

What could possibly explain my interest in the hare I am chasing, and as soon as I catch it, instead of skinning and cooking it, and enjoying a sumptuous meal, I begin to look for another hare to chase? Yes, it’s the case of the grass being greener, but I couldn’t say that directly because it sounds cliche.

I have a girlfriend, ask me who is the most beautiful woman on earth and I will give you her name. Did I say your own is ugly? No, every lady can be beautiful, only not as my own, because she is mine. I don’t love her because she is beautiful, she is beautiful because I love her.

We so easily think that other ladies, who aren’t ours to hold, are more beautiful; they are not. Angels, but who we know nothing of. It’s better to romanticize your own troubles, and to love your misfortunes, because by their being yours, you can bear them. Why love shoes you cannot afford? Why should I weep over a three-piece suit that I do not have. I know that I do wear the same pair of moccasins several times in a week, but they are mine. They are my most comfortable shoes. They aren’t the best, my taste is probably to blame, but I would choose them all over again, because they are what I have.

Most times we so easily romanticize and imagine another life and the one in our hands passes us by quickly without our noticing it. You spend most of your life fighting for a lady who wants nothing to do with you, yet there has always been by your side one who genuinely cares for you. Who in the end does a man need for a wife if not a woman who cares for him? Is really there anything beautiful about getting married to gorgeous but narcissistic woman?

I thought so too.

Maybe if I had better taste I would choose differently. Maybe if I had the money, I would love chicken. You aren’t my lady, you simply do not interest me. I eat kales everyday, yes it’s my favorite meal.

What’s your favorite dish? :)

1. Irish potatoes as they are known in the country

2. Kales as we often call them in Kenya. I just noticed they are also called leaf-cabbage. Goodness!