This week I made ricotta gnocchi. My grandmother made this dish quite frequently. She used ricotta cheese instead of potato, telling me that the potato option was “too heavy”, and she wasn’t wrong about that.  This dish is not only nourishing to the body but it’s cathartic.

Kneading the dough, rolling it into little ropes and then cutting them always gives an odd sense of satisfaction. Putting your physical energy into the dough, you’re creating positive intention with your food. Cooking, in short, is good for you. It’s good for your health to cook with fresh ingredients and it’s also good for your mind, to use your hands and take some time in preparing your meal. And it’s good for your soul to use some create energy to do something good for someone else. 

In our modern society of conveniences, it’s not the popular choice to make something from scratch. The option of convenience over an investment time makes home cooking look like a waste of time, however nothing can be further from the truth. 

Your health is worth the time investment. And it can make a huge change in your health to pay attention to the ingredients in your food (ahem, seed oils).

While ricotta gnocchi with a butter sage sauce doesn’t sound like a healthy meal, it was just what I needed to make me feel more grounded and less, well, sad. 

The thing about food is that it’s not just ingredients, magic happens in the kitchen. Through intention and desire, kitchen magic is created.  It’s this magic that is the secret ingredient of so many family recipes passed down. How many times has your Nana’s recipes tasted so much better than your own? Kitchen magic is the missing ingredient. That same kitchen magic is healing and nourishing. And it fed my soul this week, when loneliness began to creep in. 

I made something delicious and shared all of it with family and friends. While I can’t heal a broken heart or cure a physical illness, I can make someone feel special through the gift of a thoughtful meal. And isn’t that some magic in itself?