Hungry Hearts

by Elsie Chapman

  I’m looking around the kitchen and see Hungry Heart Row Food Competition flyers posted everywhere and posters of past competitions pasted along the walls too. There’re first-place trophies from the early nineties and eighties.

  “Grandma, you won these?” I ask. Of course she did. I remember that she won the Hungry Heart Row Food Competition, but I didn’t know she’d won it this many times. As much as I’m impressed, it’s extra pressure for me.

  She looks at me and just offers a warm smile, the wrinkles on her forehead lifting as she cocks her head back and closes her eyes, like she’s reminiscing or transporting herself to back in the day.

  She grabs my hand and places one of the trophies in it. “It feels just like yesterday I was cooking up almost-butter chicken and steamed asparagus, and all those other family foods.”

  I don’t say anything back. I stand still and listen, feeling the weight of the trophy, feeling the weight of pressure on my shoulders so suddenly.

  “Y’know, I never entered with the intent on winning. I went in with the intent of cooking something good, putting a piece of my soul in the food—something that’ll explode the expectations of the people tasting it.”

  It feels like all the stars have brightened and aligned. Maybe I should use one of her recipes. Ha. They’ve won in the past; maybe they’ll win again.

  “Oh, yeah?” I backpedal in my thoughts.

  “Mm-hm. Every year, the judges were blown away. You see, there’ll be a lot of folks there. Korean folks, Thai folks, Persian folks, Muslim folks, African folks, black folks, white folks, and a bunch of others—all making different things, but all with the same goal. Not all of them are gonna know to put their soul in the food and become one and the same with it. But you know how. It’s in your blood, grandson.”

  Grandma opens the book of secret family recipes and flips through it. “Any of these look good to you?”

  “That one,” I say, pointing to something that looks like glazed chicken with cheesy potatoes.

  She goes to the back to retrieve the ingredients and returns. “Ready to try it out?”

  My heart stops and then starts again. I really need this practice. If I really want to win this money for Momma, I better get to practicing. I mean, it’ll only maximize my chances of winning, right? I nod at Grandma and accept her offer to make the recipe.

  “No other person in the world outside of our family knows this recipe, kiddo,” she says. “This one is extra special. My great-great-grandmother created this one.”

  I watch her begin washing the chicken breasts and flouring them up, adding tons of different seasonings. “Pass me that paprika.”

  I watch in awe at how fast she’s doing everything, trying to memorize every move she makes. Just in case.

  I’m creating a mental checklist, searing this moment—this training montage—into my brain for future reference. Suddenly there are so many spices in the air, and I’m trying my hardest not to sneeze. Sneezing would mean I’ll blink and miss a moment.

  She takes a metal bowl out of the cabinet above the stove and then begins flattening the chicken breasts with it before frying them. She shows me how to prepare the potatoes and how to properly season them—how to know how much seasoning is enough. She even makes a joke about the white folks who will be in the competition. “They won’t know how to season anything,” she says, slightly chuckling. “Poor babies.”

  I bust out laughing too.

  “You know yo’ momma didn’t used to know how to season either. I used to have her in the kitchen cookin’ all the time. And she would drown the food in seasoning. Mashed potatoes would turn green from how much parsley she would use. Mac and cheese would be black from all the pepper. It was a mess.”

  I laugh some more. I like this. I miss times similar to this one with her so, so much and to have them back so briefly means everything to me. I take in everything, holding this moment close to my heart, like a Polaroid picture.

  “Glad she learned. And I’m glad you’re here learning from me too. I dreamed up this day. But I didn’t dream up her getting sick.” Everything stops for a brief moment. I watch as a tear or two streak down her cheek, she rubs her face with her sleeve and continues to chop up a red onion. I know Grandma feels bad about not getting to visit her daughter because of the restaurant tying her up all the time. I know every night she talks to Momma on the phone, she feels worse about not being there. “She’s gonna be a’ight, though. I’ve been telling myself that everything is going to be a’ight. My baby will be okay. The Lord isn’t gonna take her away from us like this. He won’t.”

  I sigh, trying to blink back the tears now, but I’m too late.

  “The pan needs more butter,” Grandma murmurs, like she’s trying to keep her voice down or like the tears she’s holding back are lowering the volume of her voice.

  “More butter?” I ask.

  “Not actual butter, honey,” she says, and chuckles at me. “The butter in the soul. It’s an expression from the South. It means, as you’re cookin’, try and feel more in tune with what you’re makin’. If you feel it in your soul, the taste will be amplified. Sometimes, though, things just need more butter, literally.”

  Whoa. I’m so confused. I need some time to think about this.

  “Grandma, why aren’t you entering the contest too?”

  “I would, baby. I really would. But I turned seventy this year. Sixty-nine is the maximum age.”

  “Oh.”

  “It’s your turn.”

  “But I’m scared and nervous,” I say, feeling those things even right now. I don’t make eye contact with her, until she lifts my head up with her finger like I’m a little kid again.

  I expect her to say something like, Ain’t nothing to be scared of, boy. But she doesn’t. Instead, she says, very calmly and sweetly, “That’s okay. Being scared and nervous are things you’re supposed to feel, but you gotta be brave, baby. Being brave means going on while you’re scared and nervous, keeping up that fight inside your beating heart. I promise you’ll eventually end up winning that fight.”

  My heart feels real full right now, and suddenly I’m not worrying as much, because I have the best teacher in the world—a multi–Hungry Heart Row Food Competition champion. I don’t have to worry about anything. At least, not in this moment. The thing about anxiety is that it creeps up on you whenever it wants to. Sometimes when you are least expecting and sometimes in those moments you’re trying to be the most present—the most you.

  We take the chicken out of the fryer and melt some white cheese over it before pouring the already cheese-infused potatoes on top. Her soul-smothered chicken, smothered in potatoes and love.

  One whiff of the air, and I’m in heaven. It smells so damn good, my mouth is watering, tongue tingling.

  We finish cooking within half an hour. It’s a relatively fast dish, Grandma reminds me, hoping that I use it, and then we eat up.

  I feel warm and fuzzy and like everything is going to work out and in my favor. After all, it sounds like my destiny, right? And I even think I know exactly what I’m going to make now. Already. I missed the deadline for turning in what I’m going to cook to guarantee my ingredients would be there, but their website has all the ones they’re providing, so I’ll just have to work with those.

  “I’m gonna start cleaning up ’round here. You go on and get some rest.” She hands me the key to her apartment, where I’ll be staying, to put my luggage in, and she makes sure she gives me the book of secret family recipes, and my eyes get really wide, my chest gets really tight. I grab a slice of apple pie before heading there. Her apartment is literally across the street, so I don’t have a far walk at all. I don’t even need to use the map. As I’m eating the apple pie with one hand, trying to imagine all of the ingredients before I read about them later, I’m transported back to when I was just a little boy. Suddenly I’m just ten years old, in the kitchen with both Momma and Grandma, making Thanksgiving pies.

  Before bed,
I FaceTime Momma just to check up on her and let her know how things have been going since I got to Rowbury. Once we hang up, I flip through the book of family recipes, seeing things I only vaguely remember from my childhood. I’m going to make Grandma’s soul-smothered chicken. It’s the perfect thing to try to recreate—a classic that Grandma made me that time the lights were off in our apartment and the gas bill was overdue and Momma and I lived with her. I’ll grab some ingredients from the restaurant before I head to the competition. I’m pretty sure I can do that without getting disqualified. Before I fall asleep, I make sure to go online and register what I’m going to make, and I keep Momma’s smile seared into my eyelids for motivation.

  * * *

  A few days pass by and suddenly, it’s Saturday. I wake up in the morning choking on anxiety, a familiar sourness in my gut, and at any moment, I just may throw up. I’m hoping it happens before tonight—before the food competition.

  Grandma drives me to the place where the competition is being hosted at the Rowbury Community Center, and I can see lines of people filing into the red-brick building once we pull in. I don’t know if this is all my competition or also people who will be watching me, but my anxiety is starting to act up. My chest feels tight; I can’t really breathe right.

  I rush into my backpack and pull out my headphones. I put them on and play the first song on my playlist. There’s something about the bass in this Drake song that calms me, makes me feel like I’m not drowning anymore. I can squeeze my eyes shut and work on my breathing.

  In.

  Out.

  Slower.

  In.

  Out.

  Grandma probably has no clue what’s going on with me, and she doesn’t ask, so maybe that’s a good thing so I don’t get distracted. If she were to ask, it would be all I could think about.

  Finally we arrive at the community center. Eagerly, I rush in and a gasp slips out of me from how much this is exactly what I pictured it would be. I look back, and Grandma’s waving me to come back to her.

  She hands me a clipboard for signing in and then escorts me to my cooking station before wishing me luck. When I get to my little station, I scan the room again and see all of my competition, a lump burning up in my gut. My throat is dry like I’ve eaten an entire thing of salt, and my chest is tight, and these are some of the signs of one of my panic attacks.

  The five judges take turns counting down, each saying one number, before they start the timer overhead.

  Five.

  Four.

  Three.

  Two.

  One.

  Everyone darts and zooms. Pots clinking and pans smacking. Stoves sizzling and butter caramelizing, funneling in the air like a sweet fog. The world spins faster around me. My chest feels so damn heavy. I pull out my bottle of tiny round saviors that continue to help me over and over again in times of need like this moment right now where I feel like there are a zillion fire ants in my gut and a shit-ton of grenades going off in my stomach and head, bringing on a panic attack.

  I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment.

  I put on my headphones so I can stop feeling like at any second I’ll burst into flames. I’m going through my “mellow out” playlist, keeping the volume down low enough so I can hear the judges and the timer.

  The timer above the cooking stations is blinking at me in huge red numbers how much time I’ve got left. It’s such a sad and depressing reminder of the amount of time Momma probably has left to live. Unlike Momma, at least I know exactly how much time I’ve got left. And looking at the timer, that’s one hour. At the end, no matter what, I know I’ll be alive. That’s more than I can say for Momma.

  I’m about to make Grandma’s recipe, but with my own twist. I will need to put my own soul into this dish.

  I gather all of the ingredients from a large pantry that the competitors get to choose from.

  5 chicken breasts—one for each judge

  1/4 teaspoon of salt

  1/4 teaspoon of lemon-pepper seasoning

  1/4 teaspoon of paprika

  2 tablespoons of olive oil

  3 sticks of butter

  1 onion, sliced

  1/2 cup of Colby–Monterey Jack, melted

  1/2 cup of pepper jack cheese, melted

  10 strips of maple bacon

  Some sort of green garnish

  I cut the chicken breasts into halves, season them with the dry seasonings, and bake them. When they’re ready and cooked all the way through, I wrap each half in bacon and fry them with onion slices until the bacon’s a nice, crispy, golden brown and the onions are soft and cooked through and through. The whole time they cook and simmer, I run the stick of butter around the chicken halves for even crispier edges and that buttery taste that brings anything to the next level—a strategy probably everybody black knows, and I guess it’s to my benefit there’s not many black people in this competition. I scan the crowd once more and lock eyes with Grandma. She’s got these big, alert eyes and a smile that stretches from ear to ear. I can tell she’s proud of me.

  It hits me that I’m cooking in a cast-iron skillet. Cast-iron skillets are important where I’m from—commonly used for corn bread there. They’re symbolic, if you will. Symbolic of our ancestors, but also symbolic in the sense that people are a lot like them. The way they can be absolutely resilient and multifaceted and complex and able to take the heat. Kind of like Grandma. She’s all those things and then some. She’s someone I aspire to be like some day. She carried an entire family on her back, started up her own restaurant, and became a professional cook without even having to go to school, and she’s epically won this competition almost every time she entered, proving that she’s capable of doing anything she really sets her mind to.

  Who knows, maybe this is that next step I need to take to be more like her. I tell myself that I’ve got to do crazy, hard, and brave things, like Grandma’s done all her life, to be anything like her.

  It’s all in the butter. Grandma’s voice suddenly gets stuck in my head, like she’s the Holy Ghost, and she’s guiding me through all this, showing me just what to do.

  I look around again. I see a mother and son cooking together—or at least this is what they appear to be. I see a husband and wife cooking together. I see two friends cooking together. And I see people who’re all by themselves, relying on family recipes or their own creations, like me.

  Focus, Leo.

  Don’t get intimidated.

  Don’t back down.

  More butter.

  There’s something about the smell or the sound of the bacon sizzling or something else that makes me think of Momma, that sends me swimming, no, drowning in memories of life with her healthy, growing up with a mom who knew she had a life timeline that had fewer days than her own son. I imagine buttering soft, fresh bread with her for holiday feasts. I imagine her warm smile and laugh—her usual smile and laugh, not the one she has now—the one she had back when we’d tell each other jokes as we’d cook together. It’s the thought of never ever getting any of this back that has me shaking as I let the plastic covering of the stick of butter fall into the pan. I can’t breathe all of a sudden. I crank the volume up on my headphones and fish out the wrapping and toss it in the trash.

  I force myself to release the tongs in my hand, to back away, just for a breather, a second that feels more like forever. Squeezing my eyes shut, I slow my breathing and crank the music a little louder, still not too loud, though.

  I walk back over to my station, the timer is closer to 5 minutes now. I make sure the cheese is melted perfectly before pouring it over my bacon-wrapped chicken breasts.

  I put the food onto a plate as fast as I can, still trying to be all neat about it, but remembering how Grandma used to always say that no soul food is ever “neat,” because it’s messy putting your soul into something. I just hope these judges are thinking the same way when they taste the food.

  HOLY SHIT. HOLY SHIT. HOLY SHIT.

  Oh.


  My.

  God.

  My eyes widen as I stare at the plates in front of me. Wow. Wow. I did that. I did THAT! It’s beautiful, and it looks like the way Grandma used to serve it to us, even with the fancy green garnish on the side.

  Suddenly the timer blares, and everyone who’s competing shoots their arms up, like they’re surrendering or reaching up high in the sky to collect victory stars. I let my headphones fall on my neck, keeping my hands up, high and still.

  Everything is done. This is it.

  The world is still spinning.

  My chest hurts. That money.

  Heart pounding and I struggle for breath.

  Fingers numb.

  Blood hot.

  Anxiety.

  Anticipation.

  I don’t even notice I’m crying until I feel little droplets roll down my chin, drying there. The stop siren is still buzzing and blaring for another few seconds, and all the judges come forward, weaving throughout the different cooking stations inspecting all the food for plating and style. I probably don’t get any points this round, especially since I notice I spilled a little melted cheese on the side of one of the plates. Fuck.

  The judges come over to my station, writing notes on their clipboards. Some of them have smiles. Others don’t. Some of them look at me. Others don’t. One of them even kinda rolls his eyes. I can feel my heart nearly palpitating in my chest.

  I can still hear my music playing around my neck, and it’s so bitterly quiet in this room, I’m sure everybody can hear John Mayer.

  Oh shit.

  Next is the tasting round. I need that money, I think.

  Trust in the butter. Trust that my soul is enough.

  Some people made extra food, so we can try their dishes before the judges do. I walk around and taste all kinds of food—food I’ve never even heard of or thought of. Some of it tastes so damn good; others don’t.