It’s been a hell of a week

Flights are cancelled, events are postponed, and America has cozied up at home.

The most interesting week of this decade so far has ravaged our supermarkets, sunk our investment accounts, and tested our nation.

These are the times of COVID-19.

FaceTime hangouts have replaced happy hours and trips to the grocery store mimic doomsday prep scenarios. The current state of humor, lined with seriousness, has allowed us all to commiserate with each other about the novel nature of our times.

Personally, I’ve locked myself in my studio apartment for the foreseeable future. With the taste of elderberry zinc tablets lingering on my tongue, I pray that the upper respiratory infection the doc diagnosed me with isn’t more treacherous than a common cold.

For now, self quarantining will allow us all a little extra time at home to ponder our lives, values, and next steps. These next few months will urge us to spawn more ideas and create solutions and innovations that will continue make our way of life even better.

Just look at what Isaac Newton accomplished back in the days of the plague.

In my neck of the woods of Chicago, I’ve decided to take this time to meditate on what the Coronavirus pandemic will teach us here in the United States. The first thing that comes to mind is…..

How to Eat At Home

The way we eat at home during the next few weeks will say a lot about where the American gastronomic situation is.

Aside from the memes and public commentary about toilet paper hoarders, I really wonder how Americans will ration their dollars, time, and goods in the kitchen for the upcoming months ahead.

Since we will all be a little more connected to our kitchens in the coming days, why not use the proximity to get a little more creative? Looks like we’ve all stocked up accordingly…

This morning my friend Yana dropped off three large containers of groceries on my doorstep and indulged in some friendly banter about the state of affairs at the local grocery store. Grim at best.

In order to pay homage to the dear Italians who have suffered before us and touch upon how to make use of a barren pantry, I’ve decided to cook a classic dish…..

Cavatappi Carbonara (with peas). Inauthentic, but who cares?

The “American breakfast” pasta: Eggs + Bacon + Pasta.

How to create:

1. Boil water, add a generous amount of salt. Add an unspecified amount of whatever pasta (eek, I can hear the Italians swearing from a continent away). In my case, cavatappi from the back of the cupboard.
2. Take out freshly thawed bacon that’s been sitting in your freezer for two months. Cook in pan, place on side and chop. Leave fat in the pan.
3. Eat a piece of bacon.
4. Unwrap the dry Pecorino that has also lingered a tad too long in the fridge. Grate. Place on side.
5. Stir three yolks, one white in a tiny bowl on the side.
6. When pasta is almost done, shut off heat. Drain most of the way.
7. Add some hot water to the egg yolk mixture.
8. Pour pasta into the pan with the bacon fat.
9. Add egg yolk and stir.
10. Add chopped bacon, pecorino, tons of pepper.
11. Add frozen peas and stir stir stir. (Another“sbagliato”, adding veg to this dish). Peas will melt, I promise.
12. Pick at it because you’re American and can’t wait until sitting down to indulge.

This inauthentic version of the classic Italian carbonara is comforting, easy to make, and light on the budget. Modify as your pantry necessitates.

The only downside to this dish is that your kitchen will smell like bacon until the end of the next pandemic, 2050.

If you want to make an “authentic” version of carbonara and have access to some specialty ingredients like bucatini and guanciale, click here.

The lesson that I think we will learn: how to be resourceful and thoughtful about what we make with limited resources.

Stay tuned for more quarantine updates and what else we will learn amidst this novel time.