Host: Brenda Williams - Kitchen Magic

 

 

Brenda: [00:16:32] Hello, I'm Brenda. I'd like to share with you how worth came to be defined in my family by a set of pots and pans. We have to go back to when I was about three years old growing up in London. My parents emigrated from Jamaica to England before I was born. And there was never enough money, so my mom would go to Freddy the Butcher, and she would get these scraps and turn them into these really delicious savory stews and soups. And at that age, I thought it was some kind of sorcery, some kind of kitchen magic. Total mystery. It was around that time that the door-to-door salesman came calling. He came with these stainless-steel pots, lots of them, with every imaginable insert, broiling, steaming, everything, whatever. 

 

Anyway, I don't know what it was about these pots, but they ignited in my mom some kind of fierce longing, enough that she entered an installment arrangement with this man that she could in no way afford. So, she struggled through it. I was about six years old when the box arrived. I had elder siblings who were not interested in a box, but I was. I remember my mom made me wash my hands. So, I washed my hands, and we opened the box, and we took out the pots one by one, and we oohed and aahed over their magnificence. I figured that the kitchen magic, at this point, would take on some kind of upgrade, but my mom had a different idea. 

 

She took the pots, put them back in the box, and put them on top of the fridge, [audience laughter] and that's where they stayed. [audience laughter] I remember just every year, once or twice a year, I would beg, “Oh, mommy, mommy, can we look at the pots?” She would take them down [audience laughter] from the box, “Ooh, aah.” Back in the box, up on the fridge. I realize now that she felt the pots were too good to be used, or more specifically, too good for her to use. But I was little and I fretted. I thought the pots were lonely up there. I was really afraid that they would be sad that they weren't being used for their proper purpose. 

 

Then I became a tween and a teenager, and I stopped thinking about them altogether. Until when I was 14, my family emigrated to America, New Jersey, land of all good things. [audience laughter] [audience applause]

 

Yeah, New Jersey. And so, my mom packed up all her precious things, including the pots and the box was dilapidated by then, so she got a new box. [audience laughter] They went on top of the fridge in our New Jersey apartment. At that point, I asked her, “Mom, you know, why don't you just use them? Just use them.” She gave me this little smug smile and she said, “Not just yet.” [audience laughter]. So, in the meantime, she trained to be a nurse in England, but could only get night work. And so, I took over making the family dinner, which was truly awful. We're talking tuna casserole, Hamburger helper, until eventually I learned some of her skills. 

 

I also learned that the key to kitchen magic, it's in the hands that do the work, it's in the love that goes into the process and it's also in the imagination in terms of how you work the ingredients. So, remember, not just yet. That became a reality when, at 31, I married a highly educated man, and my mom gifted us the box of pots [audience laughter] on my wedding day. My highly educated groom, he looked askance at this pot. There were much more sophisticated brands, All-Clad, Le Creuset, whatever. Anyway, I felt that my pots would not feel welcome in my fancy new home, and so we didn't use them. Eventually, I did not feel welcome in that home. 

 

It took 14 years of marriage before I got my divorce and I packed up my precious things, including my box of pots, which had been unused for 40 years. [audience laughter] I now use them every day. [audience cheers and applause] 

 

Thank you. Thank you. I experiment with them, I bang about, I singe their bottoms [audience laughter] all the time. My friends and family, they sigh around my dining room table. They breathe in those savory scents, and they often eat much more than they plan to, which thrills me. I've adjusted my thinking. It's still the hands, and it's still the love and it's still the imagination. But for me, the kitchen magic is also those pots. [audience laughter] I am finally worthy as my mother always was, even if she didn't know it. Thank you.