Ambiance

Firstly this week I thought I would start this posting off with a story from my experience of cooking this week.

The Burger Story

Tuesday night was my night to cook this week. As I was feeling a little under the weather I decided to look through the pantry and freezer to see what the easiest meal I could put together would be. There I discovered patties, lettuce, cucumber, tomato and cheese. Dah dah burgers it is. However slight problem we had no buns! This therefore meant tracking down the flatmate with the flat money and wondering down to the supermarket, however to my advantage I did a little persuading and one of the flatmates went to get them instead (as she also needed a few things herself). This now allowed me time to prepare dinner. I first started with making fries. Potato is differently a favourite in my flat. So off I set cutting those potatoes into chips. I find very hard judging how much to cook for five people. This would definitely be one of my biggest challenges when cooking. If I cook too little then everyone starves, if I cook too much then we either fight over who gets the leftovers the next day or we eat way too much! My advice if anyone has this dilemma make too much so then at least your flatmates can argue with each other about leftovers and not argue with you about being hungry! Any way back to cutting those potatoes... have you ever thought about how many different ways there is to cut potatoes?? I feel a little sorry for my flatmates as when they received my fries they got fat ones, skinny ones, long and short ones, rectangles, squares, triangles and wedges! It makes cooking a lot more fun if you can be a little creative. Once all the potatoes were chopped up there was one last thing before they went in the oven to do. That of course is to get the flats secret spice... ok well maybe not secret just favourite- that is Moroccan.  This spice goes into absolutely everything we cook. I really do recommend the purchase of this, it really does give the food extra zing and yummyness! So next into the oven were the beef patties. These patties were the chunkiest, yummiest, REAL looking meat patties I had seen in a long time. We were luckily enough to get these from my flatmates parents who live on a farm. Compared to the skinny, fake, cheap, plastic supermarket patties we usually get, we were in heaven! Next step I did was to prepare the fillings of the burgers. I peeled and grated the juicy carrots, being very careful to keep my fingers away from the grater as I didn’t think my flatmates would appreciate orange carrot with red dots. Now onto cutting the cucumber. Cucumbers are very funny shapes aren’t they? I wonder why they grow long and skinny??. Now onto the slicing of cheese YUM and the washing of the lettuce. Just as I had finished preparing the fillings my flatmates back with the buns. Perfect timing! I quickly set the table and check the fries and patties are cooked. I put all the fillings onto the table along with the interesting looking fries and the hunky, juicy patties! SWEET dinners done. Phew that’s cooking over and done with this week!

Ambiance 

Ambiance is used as a way of describing the feeling that comes from doing the whole activity. It can be viewed in a way as the spirit and essence of the activity.

When looking at the ambiance of cooking, cooking fits under the idea of food. Food is something that must be consumed in order for individuals to carry on. The essence of cooking is a biological necessity and a cyclic process that is to be done.

When I am cooking the ambiance of cooking is primarily about the need to eat and consume in order to function and live, however secondly the feeling that comes from the whole activity of cooking is it provides me with a sense of accomplishment and achievement.

This quote here from Julie and Julia shows how the character Julie thought that by cooking all of Julia’s recipes would provide her with confidence and luck however when she looked more closely into the whole activity she found that the spirit or the feeling provided her with joy (ambiance).

“Julia taught me what it takes to find your way in the world. It's not what I thought it was. I thought it was all about - I don't know, confidence or will or luck. Those are all some good things to have, no question. But there's something else, something that these things grow out of. - It's joy” (Julie and Julia, 2009).

Reference

Ephron, N. (Director), (2009). Julie and Julia: 365 days, 524 recipes, 1 tiny apartment kitchen [Motion picture]. North America: Sony Pictures Entertainment.