TAKING STOCK
Thursday Oct. 11, 2018
Make something from nothing.
Easy. Something we can all do. Not everybody is an Einstein or Edison, our intellect and education preclude from a wide rage or inventive pursuits – yet we can make something from nothing.
Which is not to say average humble humans walking the street looking like any other person walking the street can’t invent post-it notes. Perhaps an easy comparison, but follow it and you might get my point. And these key strokes now exist where it was white before. Invented from nothing.
Take stock for instance. I love this simplicity of it, as I was the morning I drafted this column, brewing stock in my kitchen. Every time I cut up vegetables – those cuttings, ends, skins and parts that don’t make it into bowl or pot don’t go into the trash. I don’t trash or compost. I save and freeze. I always have a bag of clippings in my freezer. When it bulges to overflowing it’s time to make stock. Clippings into the stock pot, tap water, boil and boil = stock. Stock for keeping in the fridge and for freezing (4 gallons), stock for making tomato sauce (2 gallons), stock for making soup (2 gallons) and stock for braising some veggies in the oven this afternoon. Something, from nothing. Scraps and water = food.
Stay with me now. How many relationships start with a handshake or a smile? No physical ingredients – just expenditure of effort for a few moments of time. Like giving an idea some pause – then saying it aloud, or writing it down. Every time, we get something from nothing.
Time to make soup …
