Recipe for a Delicious Life: Discover the Perfect Blend of Food & Music to Stimulate

Chapter Five

Harmonizing Your Inner World

YOU HAVE PROBABLY heard it said that there is nothing quite like a home-cooked meal. Some of my celebrity clients could have afforded the fanciest ingredients, but they were most content with simple fare they remembered from their childhood.

Perhaps there are basic things you had as a kid that you still eat with delight now? And then you might go to a fancy restaurant and have a gourmet meal, only to find that after time you get tired of eating out, even in a five-star setting. What’s that about?

Chances are your mother wasn’t as good a cook as some of the great ones you will find at five-star restaurants. Nor were her recipes likely to be that special. And she may not have had access to the same high-quality ingredients. But what she probably had that restaurants too often don’t was a genuine feeling for the people who are consuming the food.

You might say that best intentions are more important than best abilities or best ingredients. As Mozart once remarked, “Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius. Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius.”

At the end of the day, it’s not what’s on the menu that is the most important thing, it’s who’s behind the kitchen door. As I have said, the environment in which food is being prepared is important, but so is the person who does it.

More than just the recipes and ingredients, the care and love with which they are prepared are what sets good food apart. That’s what people are craving when they ask for childhood favorite meals; the love their mom (usually) put into what she served up. Conversely, food prepared without a lot of care and concern is simply not as satisfying—and I write as someone who knows that firsthand, from my own childhood.

No wonder our appetites often aren’t satiated. After all, we’re not just consuming someone’s cooking, we’re taking in the lack of energy and indifferent attitude with which those dishes were prepared.

I was already aware of some of this when I was traveling as private chef to The Kelly Family band. But I was fascinated to stumble across an article in a magazine, as we waited at London’s Heathrow Airport for a flight to Ireland, that confirmed what I had been sensing.

I read about an experiment in which a man was placed in a comfortable room and served the same meal on three different occasions. Each time he ate, his vital signs were measured to track the physiological effects. He was also interviewed for his personal response.

With each meal, his vital signs and verbal feedback would vary somewhat. Most dramatically, after one of the meals the man’s blood pressure shot up, and he reported how the food tasted bitter and he experienced feelings of hostility.

What the volunteer didn’t know was that the meals had been prepared using the same ingredients—but by three different people. And the person who had prepared the meal that left him feeling sick had been a prisoner.

Learning about this experiment got me excited. It helped clarify for me why all my life people had told me they felt special when eating my food, from my brother Yoram to celebrities such as Mariah Carey and Pierce Brosnan.

It also helped me understand why, throughout my career, if ever I was in an angry mood, I never wanted to touch food. Clearly, who we are at the moment when we cook affects the people who eat it. It is like we add an invisible, emotional seasoning to the food that we prepare.

The potential power of cooking with heart was made even clearer to me when I read the book The Hidden Messages in Water by Masaru Emoto. In it he described experiments in which water molecules were affected by their exposure to words, pictures, and music conveying different emotions, and how when frozen the crystals formed pleasant or ugly shapes, depending on the “message” they had received.

Some have questioned the scientific validity of his research, but Emoto’s foundational belief that negative or positive energy has the power to affect living things rang true to me. There’s no doubt in my mind that food being prepared is even more vulnerable than water to the feelings of people around it, specifically the cook. This is because cooking is an act of creation, where raw ingredients are transformed into dishes and meals. During this transformation, the ingredients are in the hands of the cook, and I believe they take on that person’s character at that moment.

Even before reading Emoto’s book, I was aware our hands can be channels of healing and comfort. Think about how masseurs work the knots and kinks out of people’s bodies, leaving them feeling calm and peaceful. In some religious traditions, priests will lay hands on people to pray for their healing.

For as long as I could remember, people had commented when I would hug or touch them kindly that they felt a warmth or comfort. That feedback had encouraged me to study reiki, the Japanese alternative healing technique of stress reduction and relaxation based on releasing the life force in someone through touch. I’d sometimes use it on clients I was especially close with, such as The Kelly Family, who found it helpful after an intense show.

Being reminded of the mind-body-spirit connection became part of the reason for my eventually stepping away from the celebrity world, for a while. Overweight and unhappy, I felt like I wasn’t being entirely honest with my clients. I wanted them to look and feel and be their best, but inside I was struggling with self-esteem that was surely going to seep through in the food that I made.

You can have the most harmonized, tidiest kitchen, but if you are simmering in resentment or stewing in anger, you are going to contaminate the food that you prepare.

Since then I have learned that just as it’s important to harmonize your kitchen, it’s also very important for you to come into the kitchen to prepare food in a state of personal, inner harmony. Having cleaned the space and the equipment, we also need to clear our thoughts and attitudes, so we can be clean vessels.

Starting Out Well

You can have the most harmonized, tidiest kitchen, but if you are simmering in resentment or stewing in anger, you are going to contaminate the food that you prepare.

With this in mind, I aim to start each day by ensuring I am centered and at peace with myself and the world around me. My morning ritual takes about an hour, but I know it’s important, so if that means setting the alarm very early because I have to be somewhere first thing for an appointment, I will.

Meditation helps me clear my mind. I will listen to classical music, which I find to be calming, especially Bach. Somehow relaxing and focusing on the music helps bring me to my highest, purest frequency. Ideally I’ll do this for twenty minutes or so, but that’s not always possible. Even five minutes is beneficial.

Then I think of the people I love and care for, and turn my thoughts to them. Though I consider myself to be spiritual, I am not a religious person, so I would not say that I pray, but I hold them in my thoughts and wish them well. I finish by spending a few moments focused on gratitude, bringing to mind a particular person or situation for which I am thankful.

You will want to develop your own daily practice, one that fits your beliefs. Forgiveness, gratitude, and being present to the world are universal principles that are accessible to everyone, whether they are atheist, Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or something else.

Generally speaking, I am a happy person by nature, so I don’t find it difficult to be positive—though I am not saying I don’t face difficulties and challenges, of course. We all do. That’s part of life. But I have always made it a point not to hold on to resentments or negative feelings. Why be envious of someone else’s success? Why not instead be glad for them and still desire the same good results for yourself? Why not look for the positive?

I’m reminded of the story of an experiment involving twin brothers from a wealthy family, Johnny and Bobby. Johnny was happy no matter what, while Bobby was the exact opposite.

The boys were put alone in separate rooms, where they were secretly observed. Bobby was placed in a room with just about every kind of toy you could imagine, everything a child could dream of, but it wasn’t enough. He complained about everything. Why did he get this model instead of that one, and so on.

Meanwhile, Johnny was led into a room with just a pile of horse manure and a shovel. He began enthusiastically digging away, and when asked why, he answered, “Well, with all this manure, there’s got to be a pony around here somewhere.”

Attitude makes all the difference!

Learning to Let Go

I try to remember Johnny’s example when I face a challenge. If I argue with somebody close to me, I allow myself to feel upset for a few minutes but I decide not to be angry. It’s a choice. Sometimes I have to talk to myself, or sometimes I have to listen to music or go do something to help me get back on track, but at the end of the day I don’t let my emotions—particularly the dark ones, which we all have—dominate.

Focusing negatively on what someone else did to me or didn’t do for me doesn’t help in the long run. I’m the one who loses. And then all that internal toxicity builds up in me, and I pass it on as I prepare food for others. Directly or indirectly, through our words and actions or the “contaminated” food we prepare, we give the negativity inside us to other people.

Though you may do all you can personally to keep the kitchen energy positive, you can’t always account for what other people bring in. Do avoid fighting in the kitchen whenever possible, though. I suggest to my clients that they build a shed outside their house and take any fights they may have out there! Of course things come up from time to time and we don’t always know how to resolve them right away. Disagreements happen, but don’t let them drag on and on. Unresolved disputes drain the life out of you and your kitchen. Remember, the kitchen is the heart of your home, so treat it with tenderness.

Remember, the kitchen is the heart of your home, so treat it with tenderness.

The intention you put into your food preparation should reflect the feelings you have for the people for whom you are cooking. This isn’t just a test of your love: you can love someone and still not feel particularly excited about cooking for them, just like my mom. But without the passion of the cook, the food is never quite as tasty, satisfying, or nourishing.

The power of food to communicate personal feeling is beautifully captured in a couple of movies I love. Like Water for Chocolate, based on the novel by Laura Esquivel, centers on Tita, the daughter of a Mexican family, who is barred from marriage by family tradition until her mother dies. She falls in love but the man is refused Tita’s hand by her mother, who instead offers the older sister in marriage. The man accepts, but only to be near Tita.

Forbidden to be with the man she loves, Tita pours all her emotions into her cooking—with dramatic results. The cake she makes for her sister’s wedding leaves all the guests sick. A year later Tita imbues a quail dish with her latent sexual desires, and her other sister is carried off naked by a soldier of the Revolution.

In the movie Babette’s Feast, two spinster sisters are awakened to long-ignored pleasures when the refugee woman who has served as their housekeeper and cook for many years uses money she wins in a lottery to prepare a sumptuous meal for the women and their friends. They gradually come alive as they allow themselves to experience the delights set before them.

While the magical style of the movies takes the point to the extreme, it’s no great stretch of the imagination to see how attitudes and emotions are captured in the food we prepare. So the question is—what do you want to feed your family and friends? Here are some tips for making sure your cooking comes straight from the heart.

• Never cook out of resentment. Ask yourself, “Do I want to cook for these people?” If the answer is yes, then do so with joy. If the answer is no, then don’t cook.

• Never cook out of obligation. This is a tough one, especially for parents who’ve already had a hard day’s work and may not have a lot of energy left to pour into preparing a meal for the family. “What am I supposed to do?” you may wonder. Everyone needs to eat.

My answer: if you’re going to put the energy into cooking, you might as well do it with love in your heart. This love won’t drain you further. In fact, your purpose in cooking, to nourish your family or guests as deeply as possible, will give you more energy and help make the food delicious and healthy.

Take a little time to get in touch with your core feelings for the people you’re going to cook for. By this I mean your deepest emotions, those beneath the surface. That means that even if you’ve had a recent disagreement or fight, you’re not letting that carry over into your cooking.

One way to do this is to think of the best qualities of the person. This will help you focus on what you appreciate about them, rather than what you dislike. If you can’t think of anything, you probably shouldn’t be cooking for them!

• Work in a beautiful environment. Flowers, candles, and music can all help elevate your mood. Put these kitchen harmonizing principles to work. You’ll be impressed by the results.

• Seek feedback. Cooking is itself a form of communication, so you will want to hear back from the people for whom you are preparing food. Talk with your family and find out what they like to eat. Explain to them you want feedback, not criticism. You don’t want to be put down. You want input that inspires you, that keeps you fresh and on your toes.

• Don’t be afraid to ask for some appreciation. If you’re taken for granted, you’re going to lose your edge. Your passion will fade and cooking will become just another chore on the to-do list. I fired two clients for precisely this reason.

They paid me well, but they had no appreciation for my food. Every day they came up with new complaints. It’s natural for people not to like one dish or another—everyone’s tastes are unique. But these two could never get specific in their criticism. They just “didn’t like” whatever I came up with. Their feedback wasn’t in any way constructive.

I realized they were two wealthy but very unhappy people who didn’t feel good about themselves and therefore didn’t feel good about anyone else. Every time I saw their name on my phone’s caller ID, I didn’t want to answer. Their negativity was like secondhand smoking. It was affecting everyone around them, and I didn’t want that.

“We hope you don’t take it personally,” they said to me. “This is just our personality.”

“Of course I take it personally,” I said as kindly as I could. “You’re negating all my energy—even for other people. It’s not fair to me or to my other clients.” I told them that I was sorry, but I could only cook for people who liked my food, otherwise I couldn’t put my full intention into my work.

Intention works both way. The eater has to reciprocate. This creates an endless cycle of giving and receiving. One feeds into the other (no pun intended)—the cook nourishes the eaters, and the eaters in turn nourish the cook. You’re inspired, and your food preparation becomes more and more elevated. Intention produces a frequency that is as real as any radio signal, one that impacts the food for the better or for the worse. It’s not something you learn so much as something you live.

Intention produces a frequency that is as real as any radio signal…

Although I have gotten unusually positive reactions to my cooking all my life, I have never taken it for granted. In the early days, I used to be shocked when I got generous compliments, particularly because I never had any formal training. Self-taught, learning from books and from watching TV, but mostly from simple trial-and-error cooking, I didn’t always know what I was doing, but I always put my heart into it. Yet people seemed to taste the positive intention.

They would tell me, “When I eat your food, I feel positive,” or “I feel like I want to exercise,” and “I feel like I want to go make a sale!” When Mariah Carey told me my pepper soup was “sweet like me,” she may not have meant it literally. But my intention truly was to nourish her and apparently this came across.