The time was ten past five pm in the afternoon of a late Saturday. Subject A, with a Barkers gin & tonic moved about the kitchen. Perched on an end of the bench I looked over the recipe.
“Venison Medallions with Caramelised Onions and salsa verde?” I questioned.
“Damn right, and we’re gonna see how it goes.” Subject A replied sprite-fully. He worked a large pot from one of the cupboards into the sink with grace.
“What’s inspired you most about cooking with Nadia?” I ask.
Subject A laughed heartily and moved the pot from the sink to the heating element, “Is this an ad for My Food Bag? Aight.” He pondered there for a second after setting the heat. “You know what I do like? I like the fact they give you the ingredients but you still have to prep them. I think if they prepped the ingredients too, I wouldn’t be about it as much.”
An avid baker, earlier in the afternoon Subject A had already made pretzels. A choice of either savoury or sweet.
Lazing on the other end of the bench, well away from the food mind you, I continue on with reading out the recipe and steps. “Why do you like that hat so much?”
“It fits on my head properly. Other hats don’t. I have a quite big head and other hats, like, sit on the top, but this like encases me. I feel safe in it. I don’t think I look good in it. But like-” Subject A shrugs. He moves over to the cupboard below my perch. “Hold on-” he interjects opening the second draw down scouring for a device to peel the veg. “Some crazy bastard put it in the wrong way.”
“Oh, that would have been me, sorry about that. G- and I were trying to find a place for it and we didn’t want to stab the draw. But upon reflection facing the sharp end towards us isn’t really-“
“Ah, it’d do the same thing just to the other end.” Upon finding the peeler he remarks, “You know, I nearly cut off my finger with this thing during the last quarantine.”
The meeting of the knife and chopping board slowed as I asked the question “What do you think goes into a good potato peeler?”
Subject A. took a moment to consider, the chopping subsiding entirely before answering. “Not cutting fingers? I dunno. What do I look like? A product designer to you? I just get a vibe there should be a built in guard- there was a guard actually,” he began to chuckle, “but I threw it away!”
“So it was user error is what you’re telling us.”
“Full heartedly, I’m not blaming the peeler dude, it was all on me. I’m not in this weird kind of limbo where I think it’s the peeler’s fault that I cut myself with it. I mean, I think it’s cursed, but other than that we’re golden.”
“Do you think 2020’s cursed?”
“Yeah. Everything’s fucked dude. The whole whole thing.”