‘They had aioli even before electricity’

We live in an accelerated culture where the lust for the immediate is ubiquitous and exaggerated, bordering on fanatical.

In every facet of our lives we strive to accomplish more and to move faster. Right now, is never soon enough.

When we are slowed down in our pursuits, we become very annoyed and impatient. I should know, at home we live with ‘country internet’ and it feels like my life is spent in a state of constant ‘buffering,’ mesmerized like Ezekiel staring at an endless spinning wheel. I’m just trying to finish my movie.

The desire to speed up human process isn’t new, of course. From the advent of the wheel and the plow through the Industrial Revolution and the massive leaps in technology witnessed in the 20th and early 21st centuries, we have been whipping about at ever greater velocity.

Much of the ‘progress’ is just that, and I’m all for progress and ease, but a brief step off the frenzied treadmill of our workaday lives can shed a light on just how lost we might be if the whole thing just stopped.

Have we lost things in the fury? Computerized cash registers have nullified the need for simple mindarithmetic in making change. Computers have all but erased our ability at penmanship, cursive writing dead like the dinosaurs. And the advent of texting will certainly drive the final nails into the coffin where spelling is concerned.

Let’s consider the kitchen. Growing up in the ’70s I will forever remember the TV commercials for Uncle Ben’s rice with Alice, the house-sitter from The Brady Bunch, proclaiming with an open palm and wonder: ‘The long grain rice that’s ready in five minutes!’ The proclamation seemed absurd, even to a young boy, and yet the acceleration was just warming up.

The advent of the microwave oven continues to be a culinary necessity for households all over the world — the entire dinner in minutes? How can we eat if we don’t own one? It is not a stretch to consider families completely unable to feed themselves if the power is out or if the microwave is pooched. And we certainly can’t be further ahead with some of the ‘foods’ designed in symbiosis with the microwave oven. Is anyone else concerned with microwaveable bacon that is crispy in 10 seconds?

Even well-established and skilled restaurant kitchens fall prey to the lure of speed and ease. Myriad gadgetry and machines exist to make our jobs easier and faster. And they do. Until they don’t.

“Chef, I can’t make the aioli for the frites today,” a flustered cook murmurs to her shoes.

Initially I am worried something is wrong with her health, but closer

inspection rules this out. “Why?” I ask.

“Oh, well, the Kitchen Aid is not working,” she stammers “so it’s impossible.”

I am not angry, but a little shocked. I take a bowl from the shelf, twist up a moistened sidetowel into a circular shape and set the base of the bowl onto it. “This is to prevent the bowl from sliding all over the counter while you make the sauce,” I say. Into the bowl I spoon two cloves of fresh garlic I have ‘puréed’ by smashing and scraping with the side of my chef ’s knife and a pinch of salt on my cutting board. One teaspoon of Dijon mustard, the yolk of an egg and a healthy squeeze of lemon juice.

She is staring a little wide-eyed when I produce a whisk and begin to bring the mixture together, slowly drizzling in olive oil with my left hand as I continue to whisk. The sauce thickens and whitens as the emulsion happens. At this point she appears truly mystified.

“I had no idea this was possible without a machine,” she gasped.

“Oh sure,” I said. “They had aioli even before electricity,” trying hard not to sound cynical or demeaning. I never again saw her produce aioli other than by whisk and her own hand.

Part of me wishes I gave her an even older lesson with mortar and pestle.

— Ross Midgley moved from P.E.I. to Niagara in 1999. Since then he has held the lead position in several of the region’s top kitchens. chefrmidgley1968@gmail.com