Memories in the cupboard

Most New Year’s resolutions have likely been abandoned by now, as S. Irene Virbila of the L.A. Times relates. However, there was one resolution that Virbila was determined to complete, that of cleaning out her kitchen cabinets and drawers. She vowed to get rid of any items she hadn’t used in a year’s time. In the process of digging through the host of kitchenware she had acquired over the years, Virbila unearthed more than gadgets–she was flooded with a rush of memories. 

She recalls the excitement of bringing home new treasures when she first started to cook in her 20s when she would visit kitchen stores in her travels and “carry home some treasure or other – a yellow ceramic mortar and pestle splashed with green, a cataplana (the hinged copper vessel the Portuguese use to steam shellfish), a hand-carved wooden corzetti stamp for pasta.”

The thought of parting with these beautiful tools that carry memories of special  meals or people was too much for Virbila to bear, a sentiment we can all understand. So she has changed her resolution to making sure she uses the treasures she’s accumulated. Her effort to clean has turned into a journey of discovery as she relates how “coming across the zigzagged pastry cutter that the late Lidia Alciati of Guido restaurant in Italy’s Piedmont gave me inspires me to make tajarin or agnolotti again…These tools bring back memories of friends and rollicking late-night dinners.”

Perhaps this story can inspire us to revisit some neglected kitchen tools gathering dust in the back of our cupboards, and relive some special memories in the process.