The Little Black Book

I’ll bet you have one of these tucked away somewhere safe; in your bag, by the nightstand, or perhaps if it’s small (and you’re busy enough?) in your back pocket…

So, whatcha got? Deep thoughts, song lyrics, sordid details of steamy encounters annotated with a star rating system? Lucky. Me, I’ve got grocery lists and doodles of dishes I daydream about…oh, and ancient Chinese secrets. (More on that in a bit.)

I’ve been lucky (or crazy?) enough to have spent a little bit of time working in a kitchen, and almost every cook I’ve met so far has had one of these squirreled away close by, ready to bust out at any moment for quick reference and inspiration. Filled with notes, recipes and prep lists, often the poor things (the book, that is, but then again…) are sad looking creatures, a bit yellowed and dog-eared, perhaps with a few pages stuck together with miscellaneous food bits.

mmm, crunchy green curry…

So, um, what's all the fuss about? If you’re one of the brave (or again, crazy) working in a kitchen, I guess it’s all a matter of perspective.

Number of hours a day spent smelling like fryer oil and onions…ooh, lost count…is it after midnight already?

Amount of humiliation and friendly heckling tolerated in the name of producing a killer glaze/puff dough/(insert particular food nemesis here)…I’d say just a hair under the exact amount necessary to bring on a full hippy freak out.

The number of pounds shed (or gained, stupid pastry/cheese station) worrying that today’s gonna be your special day where no amount of hustling seems to help, and you’re doomed to be in the weeds and therefore the focus of chef’s increasingly hairy eyeball…oh boy, I can’t even answer that without first scarfing back a chocolate tart.

Which leads us to: The value of a(n often secret) recipe, gleaned from the toil of your labours, honourably bestowed upon you by your mentors and peers as they saw fit, bequeathed, as it were, by the very grace of the kitchen gods… priceless.

I am a thief. I “borrowed” this recipe from a fellow cook and never gave it back. (Sorry, M!)

Ok, so that was a tad melodramatic, but seriously, we do love us a good notebook. Oh, the stories they tell.

I’ve gone through a few, but my trusty moleskin is by far my favourite. Not only does it have a super romantic history behind it - Matisse, Hemingway and the lovely, if fictional, character of Amelie are just a few of its patrons - but it comes with a pocket in the back! I love pockets, especially since I am the queen of collecting recipes/lists/bus transfers, in that order.

And they’re good for stashing away dessert menus too.

Just thought I’d share some of my more legible scribblings…otherwise known as the result of nagging my mom for an entire month for those tasty and totally elusive Chinese soup recipes she so casually busts out now and again.






It’s a comical, if difficult, situation really. I’ve grown up slurping back secret tonics – “good for hair”… "to make skin smooth”… "for immortality”, you know – and until quite recently, haven’t been able to describe them with any justice. Somehow “the one that smells like sweet porky-ness, with the white bark bits and red raisin things” does not a delicious description make.

So I finally got the scoop and drew everything out, with really poor phonetic translations to boot. Thanks mom!


And that is what’s in my little black book. Now the red one, on the other hand…