Honesty at the Table: Nourishing the Mind, Body, and Soul |
There are moments — in home kitchens, small cafés, family restaurants, and even the “top end of town” of Michelin-starred establishments — when someone from the kitchen may walk towards the preparing meals, stop, look, lean, and taste the simmering meals, look up and say, “Hmmm, they all look and taste great, but it still needs a little something extra.”
These words are about honesty. They are an expression of sincerity and care — the genuine kind of care offered by someone who wants the meal, beyond its taste and flavors, to also bring emotional warmth, joyful conversations, and perhaps additional insight and self-reflection to everyone, including those preparing the meal and those who will soon gather at the table to share in its enjoyment.
The purpose is simple: to ensure that the meal is not only delicious, but also nourishing to the mind, body, and soul of those who will share it. A meal becomes more than food when it creates the conditions for connection, belonging, the joy of kinship conversations, and the collective delight that arises among family and friends sharing a meal (Baumeister & Leary, 1995).
When preparing a meal, recipes guide the process. The recipe may be written; it may have been learned through observation and conversation; it may have been explicitly taught with tastings over many years or generations; it may have been learned through culinary apprenticeships; or it may now even be acquired through technology.
Yet even with the best preparation, it is only when each component is tasted and visually confirmed that one can judge whether the meal meets the required standard of excellence for what has been created. Yes, created is the right word here. Achievement and excellence are not accidents; they are created.
Excellence Relies on Honesty and Integrity
In these moments, as noted, only one standard applies: excellence. This is about understanding what excellence in food preparation is and how it is achieved. This is not a science; it is an art, and that is what makes it difficult. It is understood when experience informs and allows one to say, “Yes, I can taste the difference now.” That’s the difference — in terms of culinary knowledge — between a cook and a chef.
This involves years and being supported and guided by every tasting, every adjustment, every act of care along the way. Excellence also — in absolute terms — involves openness, honesty, sincerity, and trust. If what is being prepared meets this standard, this should be acknowledged with the same sincerity that shaped it.
If it does not, what is important here, and imperative, is that the same honesty and integrity must be expressed if the cooking and the meal itself are not up to the required standard. This must be made known. Without directness, honesty, sincerity, and integrity, excellence cannot be achieved.
And when understood in this way — through the act of preparing something to be shared — these qualities reveal themselves as universal principles, the kind that hold true in any kitchen, any conversation, any relationship, and life itself (Baumeister & Leary, 1995; Gherardi, 2012; Goodman, 2003; Mayer et al., 2012; Sennett, 2008;........