Why “desired tenderness”?

The title of my substack was inspired by the seemingly devil-may-care cooking method for pasta. After bringing a (what always seems unreasonably large) quantity of water to a boil, the instructions simply state you are to cook until “desired tenderness.”

I thought, how true, we do all have our own unique desired tenderness.

So is this a newsletter about cooking then? I can say with a very high level of confidence it is not. I do not cook so much as I plate. Well, isn’t that maybe a bit misleading? Absolutely. But I think being a little uncertain about what to expect is now officially the status quo. Will it at least include food recommendations? Well, occasionally. But it will also include suggestions of things to touch, see, hear and smell. Well, couldn’t this whole thing be accused of just being somewhat narcissistic noodling? Oh, quite inevitably.