Rediscovering my love of cooking in Cilento
Cooking was part of my life long before it became my work. As a child, I liked being in the kitchen: tasting, smelling and trying to understand how ingredients came together. I imagined becoming a chef.
The route I took was less straightforward. Some of the kitchens where I worked put speed and cost ahead of the care I wanted to give the food. Over time, something I had enjoyed began to feel like a routine to get through.
Moving to Cilento, in southern Italy, did not bring that pleasure back all at once. It gave me room to notice it again.
When cooking became work
I went to hotel school and later started my own business. I learnt a great deal, but my idea of success changed along the way. I became more concerned with keeping the business moving than with the reasons I had wanted to cook in the first place.
There was always another task, another deadline or another reason to hurry. Cooking had become part of that pace.
Looking back, I can see how far I had moved from the child who simply wanted to be in the kitchen.
Finding pleasure in simple ingredients
In Cilento, I began to pay attention to food differently. Vegetables from the garden, local cheese and olive oil gave me reasons to cook without needing to turn every meal into a performance.
I started making bread again. I enjoyed the smell from the oven, a tomato roasted until its flavour deepened, and the familiar work of chopping and stirring.
These were small things. They helped me remember that cooking could be satisfying in itself, even when there was no customer to impress and nothing to prove.
The way I cook now
At Selvitelle, the garden and the seasons influence what I feel like making. I value simple food and ingredients worth paying attention to. Sharing a meal with friends can be enough of an occasion.
That does not make every day effortless. There is work here too. But I have found a way to give cooking a different place in my life.
I no longer need it to carry the weight of being successful. I can enjoy making something because I want to eat it or share it.
Making room for what matters
This is my experience, rather than a recipe for changing someone else's life. Moving to Italy was part of my story; rediscovering an old interest need not require such a large step.
For me, it began with having enough space to notice what I had missed.
If you would like to know more about the place where that happened, read our story.
