WOODS & WATERS

CAN A NON-COOK HAVE A j

zBY EMILY MORRISON Signature Dish? THOUGH I WOULDN’T call myself a cook, I’m a mom of three and the kids gotta eat. I’m a meal-maker more out of necessity than inclination. Honestly, the most impressive thing I make in the kitchen is a mess.

When the kids were younger my go-to meal consisted of pasta and sauce. You don’t need to be Julia Child to boil water in a pot and throw some Prego on top. ‘Course I burned some saucepans and cooked some spaghetti that resembled twisted pipe cleaners, but it killed hunger and the kids didn’t complain, much.

Gradually, I branched out to lasagna and an occasional meat loaf but breakfast and lunch took care of themselves — cereal, soup and sandwiches.

As our cherubs entered their teens and began toasting bagels, packing lunches and saying, “We don’t care what you make,” I relaxed my relatively low cooking standards. My lackluster culinary habits had a particular pattern: mac-and-cheese Mondays, taco Tuesdays, takeout on Wednesdays, every man for himself Thursdays, and pizza parties on Friday night.

Life had reached a food zenith — easy, delicious and in no way nutritious.

Then, my children did something I thought they’d never do — they developed nutrition, ethics and higher culinary expectations. My oldest went vegan, the middle child decided she only liked turkey clubs and the youngest became a vegetarian.

Almost overnight my dinner prep became thrice as difficult. How could one meal satisfy three different appetites? I needed to find a one-pot wonder that had a little something for all my carbicarni-herbivores to enjoy.

So, I decided to try my hand at a vegan chili recipe that the vegan would like, the vegetarian would love, and the turkey sandwich eater could stare at while she ate more sandwiches. Eventually, I stumbled upon a meat substitute called Impossible Burger made from water, soy and coconut oil, and I’ve recently become obsessed with adding this sneaky plant protein into the bean, corn, pepper, tomato and veggie broth mixture. When I say I’ve become obsessed, I mean I can’t stop myself from cooking one giant vat of this goodness every four days, and when it runs out, I make more. Could this be my signature dish? I don’t know, but I come from a long line of signature dish makers. Grammie served venison so delicious it tasted like real beef, Aunt Laura whipped up decadent chocolate and tapioca pudding from scratch and Meme made New England boiled dinners every Sunday for her family. As for my immediate family, my mother has perfected the “smooshed sandwich” (chicken, stuffing and cranberry sauce leftovers squished inside two pieces of white bread) and my sister consistently produces the best crockpot mac-and-cheese on the planet. Me? What’s my claim to culinary fame? I think I make a mean vegan chili. In fact, it’s so mean my husband can’t stomach it anymore. Literally, he’s had so much that the acid level in his stomach has changed — he’s on antacids and can no longer enjoy tomato sauce, beer, coffee or anything spicy. Go figure. But you know what? I still make it. I make it for my son, for my oldest when she’s home, and for myself, because I love coming home and warming up something that’s already made. And isn’t this the beauty of food, that it warms us up from the inside out? Good sustenance, whether we’re providing or enjoying it, fills us both physically and spiritually. Filling up bellies is one way we show our love. This is why I threw my students a pizza party the other day, why my mother just bought a boatload of snacks for our three-day-vacay into the mountains, and why my mother-in-law continues to send chocolate chip cookies out to the vegan in Vermont every week. Food is love, so if I can keep scraping my love together, throwing it in a pot and sharing it with everyone except my husband, then maybe I’m not doing half-bad after all. Now if I could only master vegan mac-n-cheese, I might have two signature dishes.