I’m an empty nester, and I feel it most keenly in the kitchen
But this home cook with reduced purpose has found a few silver linings in her dinner-for-one pots and pans
Last summer, I waved goodbye to my youngest son, Victor, on the campus of the University of Michigan, in Ann Arbor. My oldest son, Felix, left home two years ago to study business in Europe. They’re both doing well, and that makes me happy.
But that also makes me an empty nester, and a home cook with reduced purpose.
I had been thinking about this new phase of my life for months, years even, probably since the day my sons were born. It’s an adjustment many parents go through. I expected I would miss them, and I do, but I miss cooking for them, too. In fact, I sometimes invite my sons’ closest friends to eat at my table when they are in town. Their lively company, and the meal we share, help me shoo away the empty-nester’s blues.
Downsizing a meal for three to dinner-for-one offers a new learning curve. Large pans are retired, little pots go to work on little stove burners. The kitchen apron feels presumptuous. It’s just me.
When grocery shopping, it still takes a mental effort to return extraneous items to the shelves. Back goes the whole cauliflower, the gallon of milk, the five bananas, the large box of cereal. With each dismissed item comes a tiny jab of separation anxiety.
Should I bother cooking at all and go for take-out instead, subscribe to a meal delivery plan, or buy frozen dinners? I can already see myself dining into my old age on a monotonous series of microwaved rations.
Now, after I took Victor to college, I didn’t just stress about reconfiguring my eating habits. I worried the food culture I had built with my sons would be forgotten.
Raising discerning eaters has been a big part of my sons’ education, as it was part of mine. Over the years, they turned into my trusted food testers, occasional sous-chefs, and closest meal companions.
As a divorced mother and their main caretaker, I have been homework tutor, piano coach, soccer cheerleader, discipliner, comforter, travel guide, and all that. But I especially liked being my sons’ private chef.
After the breakup of my marriage, the boys and I lived in my native France for a while. It was a tough time, but we made the best of it. We budget-traveled around Europe, and everywhere we went, local specialties were our favorite cultural snapshot. We feasted on thick and silky yogurt with blueberries in Iceland, crunchy al dente spaghetti in Italy, crispy croquetas and tapas in Spain, fish and chips and sticky toffee pudding in England.
In our home base of Burgundy in France, I would experiment with staples I had long forgotten about after living in the United States for over two decades. I’d retool ready-meals bought at my favorite frozen food supermarket, like couscous with merguez, lentil soup, or ratatouille. They came in handy when this then-single parent — and radio correspondent — filed stories across the Atlantic well into the evening, and served dinner after 9 p.m. On Wednesdays, our lunch menu almost always featured a golden and juicy bird from the local roast chicken truck. We ate it with string beans and home fries while watching Harry Potter movies on a loop.
But on most days, I’d channel my Gallic roots and bake all kinds of pies, quiches, leek tarts, savory pastries stuffed with ham and Raclette cheese, or rhubarb crumbles and clafoutis with fruit from the farmers’ market. It was a litmus test for my French cooking skills and an education for my sons who were discovering new textures and flavors. I knew I’d hit the mark when seeing their stunned faces after they’d bite into a gougère, a kind of cheese popover, or a tarte Tatin, an iconic upside-down pie with caramelized apples.
When we returned to our American home base in the Boston area, I kicked my culinary skills up a notch. Encouraged by my budding foodies, and challenged by the multitude of mouthwatering recipe photos on social media, I made cooking my creative outlet. I experimented with Middle Eastern and Asian-inspired recipes, stir-fries, roasted vegetables, and layer cakes, always making the boys sniff the vivid fragrance of the crushed spices used in each dish.
We would sit down to eat and I’d welcome my sons’ feedback. Whether the dish was overcooked or under-seasoned, they would comment about its merits and offer polite tips on what could have worked better. They’d often parody phrases heard on our favorite cooking show, “MasterChef,” declaring: “visually: stunning!” pursing their lips and joining the tips of their fingers, just like the cooking competition’s judges. They are the best dinner guests a home cook could hope for.
When they reached their mid-teens, it was fun watching them gobble supersized quantities of food. Entire caldrons of white bean and kale soup with fennel or trays of baked mac and cheese with roasted garlic would barely last the evening. Victor would have second and third helpings until his stomach hurt. To this day, that is how he decides he’s had enough to eat. I don’t know where that slim and fit young man stores it all.
Their epicurean nature impresses me. When eating any dish with sauce, Felix ditches his fork for a spoon, to not waste a speck of it. He takes his time, too. I am, regrettably, a high-speed eater, but Felix is a true hedonist who insists on savoring every mouthful, at a relaxed pace.
Last summer, I enjoyed watching the boys fuss over sandwich-making, adding here a pinch of Himalayan pink salt, there a drop of olive oil, salad greens and butter on the bread, lightly toasted, of course. The truth is, they’ll eat almost anything, but if there’s a way to improve a meal, from chicken wings to chicken cordon-bleu, they will find it.
Now a few months into total unnesting, I can see signs we’re creating new ways of sharing meals and fueling our food worship.
Felix often video-calls me during his meal prep time, while he chops, sautés, or boils stuff in his Berlin galley kitchen. The last dish he showed me was an Iranian recipe of chicken breast and onions marinated with yogurt, lemon, and saffron. “I’m cheffing like crazy,” he said, beaming.
Victor doesn’t need to cook yet. He lives in a college dorm that has a ridiculously gourmet dining hall. He sends me photos of his dinner picks. On the menu recently: caramelized ribs with collard greens, coconut curry, Mediterranean chicken with olives and preserved lemons, and caramel cake. Not even a trace of mystery meat.
Back in my kitchen, I did find a silver lining in my dinner-for-one pots and pans.
First, it turns out that not having to feed anyone at any particular time can be liberating. It has unleashed an improvisational streak in me. I tasted the resulting flavors recently in a zucchini and corn gratin with feta, a mushroom risotto, and a lemon foam sort of yogurt cake with blueberry compote I am not sure what to call. Naturally, I shared snapshots of these dishes with my sons so they could eat with their eyes.
Second, if some cooking experiment goes wrong, no problem! I can toss it and go for a bowl of mush, or straight to dessert. Because a full dinner, any dinner, is now optional.
Third, one tasty meal for three now yields three tasty meals for one.
Finally, it’s comforting that my cooking experiments now also serve as practice for the meals my sons and I can share in my kitchen again, every time they come home.