Facts about me: I can’t stay awake past 1 am and I can’t drink more than 1 glass of wine (and that’s on a wild day). I am a grandma trapped in a 25 year old’s body. I only like going out at night if there is dancing or singing or comedy involved. Otherwise, I’d rather be doing this.

There are few things more enjoyable to me than a slow evening of cooking, and it’s even better when I can share it with others. Cooking is an easy meditation of all the senses. You can enjoy looking at colorful fruits and veggies, you feel their textures transform as you cut them and cook them, you are surrounded by fragrant aromas and you get to taste test as you go. Cooking requires focus, and it’s hard to have an existential crisis when you’re handling a knife or a stove top.

I especially like sharing food with friends because it’s a gesture of love. There is time and effort spent in making a meal for someone, and it’s very rewarding when someone else genuinely enjoys it.

Last night, I made one of my fave dishes, a vegetarian bolognese. Looks like meat right?! My diet is 90% vegetarian at this point because, while I love the taste of certain meats, animals are way too cute to me, and I could not kill them myself (also, a bazillion other reasons…environmental impact, stupid industrialized agriculture, my health). So I save meat eating for special occasions and, instead, make yummy dishes like this that make my belly and my soul feel good. And I trick my friends. 😉

Sometimes I feel FOMO because I think I should be out in the streets with a mini skirt on, singing Despacito from an Uber, but then I remind myself that’s not what I need to be doing right now.

A reminder to you, my friends, that you gotta do what makes you feel good – whether that’s turning up or turning down – and just enjoy that. For me, recently, it has been more of these kitchen and living room moments.

TURN DOWN FOR WHAT? A detox mask, what else?

xoxo

Trace