When I was 10 years old, I was once woken up by the smell of olive oil, garlic and meat frying in the pan.
The largest pan my mother had was on the stove — she was browning meat at the very bottom for just a few minutes and then placed it on a plate next to her.
Later that day, my entire family would be coming over to celebrate Easter Sunday. In about six hours, there would be about 20 or 25 people gathered around the table, eating large bowls of pasta with dense, rich sauce — a Sunday sauce.
There is nothing quite like the ritual of a Sunday sauce to an Italian-American family — the stereotypes are true.
For me, being away from home on Easter this year was difficult, primarily for this reason.
I really felt the absence of my family and my mother’s cooking. It’s her food that has always had the ability to heal me, both physically and mentally.
From simple pastina soup when I’m sick — a small, star shaped pasta in chicken broth — or her extravagant Christmas dinners with everything from pasta to ham and a plethora of vegetables — even as a junior in college, I still miss her food just as much as I did when I first came here.
This Easter, I decided to prepare Easter dinner myself. For the first time, I chose to take my mom’s recipe and attempt to create a special Easter dinner for my friends.
For the entire week leading up to it, I asked my mother what exactly to buy: which tomatoes, which cuts of meat and which type of wine to use to deglaze the pan. It turns out I bought a wine entirely too expensive to be used for cooking.
It was intimidating, to say the least. The steps overwhelmed me, not to mention the great fear I have of undercooking meat and giving my friends salmonella.
On the morning of Easter, equipped with all the necessary ingredients, I began with the simplest of steps: chopping the garlic, shallots and parsley.
With apprehension, I placed my very own, massive pot on the unreliable electric stove in my apartment. My mother sent me the pot as a gift a few days before, specifically so I could cook for a certain number of people.
I took out the cuts of meat she directed me to purchase, and before allowing the lamb to touch the now-hot olive oil, I called her.
With each subsequent step, I sent her photos and called her for her opinions and thoughts on my progress. Is the meat brown enough? Yes. Is the sauce boiling enough? No, raise the heat. Is this enough garlic? No, add another clove.
The sauce needs to be stirred every 15 minutes and as such, I was tethered to the kitchen all morning, accompanied by my roommate, Alana and her boyfriend, Peter, who had woken up just like I had as a child, to the smell of meat cooking in some olive oil.
While the sauce simmered and bubbled on the stove, I turned my attention to the best part: making the meatballs.
My roommate and her boyfriend sat on either side of me and helped me roll out about 20 meatballs. After they seasoned the meat with a variety of seasonings and herbs, we all — and they competitively — began to roll out small circles between our gloved hands.
My mom told me setting some meatballs aside to share while I finished cooking was an important step. So, once the meatballs were fried up, we all shared a few before I put the rest into the warm but threatening, bubbling cauldron.
In only five hours and dozens of swirls with a wooden spoon, the meal was done, plated and served to those closest to me.
It felt good to prepare something I was so accustomed to growing up and to share a tradition that I had not realized meant so much to me until it was gone. In this way, I felt close to my mother through the verbal, non-precise measurements of breadcrumbs and basil.
Just like my mother had allowed me and my sister to help roll out the meatballs with her, I had my friends help me. To them, I echoed what my mother always used to say to me after helping her with this task: thank you so much — imagine how long it would have taken me without your help.
It was surreal to feed those I love with the flavors I grew up eating and to task my friends with helping in the ways I did.
I think it is through the labor of love that the best moments are forged. The conversations spoken over carefully crafted meals, perhaps, are always the most meaningful and careful ones.
To feed is to sustain — to sustain life, to sustain conversation and to sustain relationships over time.
