My Satori-moment of cooking (why I cook)

I discovered, fending for myself for a few days, as they say in New Zealand “baching”, as my wife and daughter went on a holiday to visit family in India, the satori of cooking. I shall tell you how.

I started reading a wonderful book by Thich Nhat Hanh, the Vietnamese Buddhist Monk (I call him “saint”), I call him my spiritual Guru— a book by the title of “Happiness”. It’s a great book on mindfulness practices and covers everything on mindfulness you need to know and lead your life.

I realised cooking was as much a ritual and as much a process of mindful meditation as any, exactly, as Dr Weil writes here in this most amazing piece. Thay, as Thich Nhat Hanh is lovingly referred to, even wrote about putting together a small incense or an artifact in your kitchen, respectfully bowing to it and treating it as if you were meditating in front of the Buddha when you started cooking. Cook in silence, with mindfulness, and eat in silence as well, if you can.

So one day, after work, I bought an incense candle as I came home. Not only that; instead of heading to a cafe for my evening meal, or planning to cobble together some cooking from YouTube at night, or heating stuff in microwave, I actually bought a pack of Salmon Fillets from a supermarket and came home.

I placed the candle on the kitchen window, lit it carefully. Then held the candle in the cup of my hand and carefully placed on the kitchen window sill as if I was placing an image of The Buddha on an altar. Then I deeply and respectfully bowed before it and silently recited a Gatha. At that instant, an aroma of fresh cranberries (the candle was cranberry flavoured candle, ;-)) wafted in the room, and I felt hungry. Yet I had promised to be mindful in my cooking and eating. A lot of dialogues came rushing into mind, but Thay instructed in his book to remain mindful, silent, and watch your breath. So I took three deep mindful breaths, then prepared a baking tray and lined with aluminium foil, and put one fillet of Salmon skin side down. Then I drizzled a tablespoon of macadamia nut oil (God knows why it was there. Wife must have kept it for a reason, or what to do with it, I had no idea at that stage), one tablespoonful apple cider vinegar (Huh you say? It was a good thing to do I silently told myself), and one teaspoonful of Coleman mustard smeared it all over the fish (mustard? why oh why? Well I should tell you that I come from Bengal, and as any red-blooded Bengali will tell you, our fish is not complete without “shorshe”, ground mustard seed. Well, not _this_ Coleman mustard, but what do I know?). I then sprinkled a dash of salt and a dash of freshly ground black pepper, and drizzled some soya sauce (Soya Sauce? What for? Instinct, besides, I come from the East). Thus prepared, I inserted the fish in a preheated oven at 200 degree centigrade and kept there for 10 minutes and then kept the whole thing at warming mode for another 10 minutes mindfully watching the fluid around the fish sizzle.

Then I took it out, bowed at the candle, at the fish, and laid it carefully on the table on a plate, and prayed a little Gatha. Indeed, this is what my Guru TNH instructed me.

Then ate mindfully starting and ending with a Gatha. Added in the last minute a bowlful of mashed potato and a few pieces of toasted bread.

The Satori of eating arose in me. Most intriguing.

I totally agree with Dr Andrew Weil, cooking is mindfulness, it is deep concentration. After a day’s busy work, focusing on the food that you prepare yourself with deep concentration and then washing the dishes, there arises Satori. A realisation that you are part of this giant system, where the universe flows through you. The interconnectedness of it all. Ever since this experience, I have continued the process of cooking from scratch, sometimes not. But cooking at home is now a part of my ritual, my everyday meditation.

Metta.