In the last sentence of their book ‘eat, think and be merry‘ Fritz Allhof and Dave Monroe encourage us to ‘eat good food and think about it’. Consider me encouraged – actually, truth be told – not much encouragement is needed. Upon waking, my first thoughts are about food and what’s for breakfast, lunch, dinner. On weekdays it’s porridge, homemade crunchy or bircher muesli, and a cup of aromatic, strong Finnish coffee. I can eat porridge at any time of the day or night and I’m not constrained by rigid rules about what food has to go in my mouth at any particular time – now is good. Weekends start a bit more lazily and leisurely with a fry up of e.g. bacon and eggs, or shakshuka, pancakes or french toast. When I was a little girl, one of my favourite Books was the classic ‘Milly, Molly, Mandy‘ by Enid Blyton and the aroma of fried onions being cooked in butter by her mother on a Saturday morning, came wafting out of the page, into my mouth, up my nostrils and down into the depths of my hungry stomach.
However, as an educationist who is passionate about sustainable learning (multilingual business communication & second-language identity) I also get that their ‘think‘ means more than just eating. For me, it’s also about knowing the provenance of the food that goes into my mouth: where it came from, who I’m supporting when I buy it, what I carry it out of the shop in, how I can use as much as possible without being wasteful, and increasingly how it is packaged.
Our relationships with culture, our sense of self, our social and national identity are also communicated through the food we cook and the meals we share. When I first met my Finnish husband in Hong Kong, I went to my favourite bookshop to buy a book on Finland so I could learn about the country that was going to be my new home. Instead of finding a Lonely Planet type publication, interestingly the only book they had was… a cookbook. However, from this book I not only learnt about Finnish food, but the customs & family rituals associated with it, the ever-challenging & unique Finnish language, and it still takes pride of place on my bookshelf. Yes, finnzkitchen© is about inspiring you to eat, think and be merry, but I also hope to construct a space for conversation and reflection. A space where we can celebrate and learn to value our diversity as well as our sameness. I hope you enjoy my offerings and please feel free to test, adapt and give feedback on how to improve the recipes.
Welcome to my table!