Small Fires

Big love

Dear bread fans,

I’ve fallen in love with a book, SMALL FIRES: An Epic in the Kitchen by Rebecca May Johnson. The book came out in the UK last year but arrived in the US last week, and I’ve been thrilled to see the warm welcome it’s received.

This radical book about cooking says so many things I’ve thought — that language hides the labor involved, that when women write about food, the book will be lovely, not deep or intellectually useful.

Johnson challenges these ideas by comparing the cultural respect given to translating Homer’s Odyssey to the minimization of an individual’s ‘translation’ of a recipe. She points a deliciously feminist finger at the centuries of awe lavished on classical literature vs. the millennia of disregard surrounding the work of cooking and feeding. She carries us through an argument that recipes restrict creativity, battling by joyously cooking, dancing & writing poetry.

While I adore the whole book, I think I am most grateful for the long chapter that considers the intimacy involved in the act of cooking. She brings you right up close to her thinking—please follow me into her mind!

Reading this book aligned with a rich moment in real life. Last weekend, my friend Azuré asked me to carry a flag she made for FLAGSSS, a great parade in Troy. She used a house dress stamped with bright orange letters UPLIFT THE UNSEEN. The invisible she called to the moment were the matriarchs whose works of community care support leaders/heroes/everyone.

FLAGSSS grew out of Troy’s Flag Day Parade, which used to be quite large. Mummers came up from Philadelphia, and every fire department in the county rolled through our downtown. After 9/11, a float had a cardboard model of the Twin Towers. Always, an ancient crooner lip synced Sinatra songs in a Cadillac. People sold pretzels and sodas from shopping carts, and metallic balloons.

The FlagSSS Day Collective was formed after the Flag Day Parade stopped happening, & twists the drama of patriotism into a sweet community time.

I hope you have things like this that help you feel uplifted & seen, books that rhyme with your mind and people who hold your heart. And lots and lots of bread.

Love, Amy

Notes:

Interview with Rebecca May Johnson

https://www.eater.com/23751386/small-fires-an-epic-in-the-kitchen-rebecca-may-johnson-interview

Image credit to EP Press

Info about FlagSSS https://flagsssday.org/about/