Shirlé & Kumar Go to Taco Castle.
I cooked for a single dude for years who requested the same Mexican inspired meals EVERYDAY. SINGLE. WEEK...even when he became most definitely NOT single.
Kumar was a client of mine for nearly 6 years. He was a single professional, living in a gated community amid luxury condos and a multitude of McMansions. He owned his own business, owned two sports cars and was about my age of 40 at the time. He was a gentle, funny man, who had been born in Southeast Asia. He lived alone in a huge house that was barely furnished. He had no pets. He had no pictures of family or friends. Just the bare minimum, almost as if he had just moved in with sparse details to give a picture of who he was, but over the years nothing changed with the interior.
When I first started cooking for Kumar he suggested that he would like to try all sorts of cuisines. He wanted variety and he was looking to improve his health. With that said, we decided on a vast array of flavors and textures but with health being first and foremost. The first month or two he was giving me great feedback on the meals he was now eating for both lunch and dinner, enjoying most things. He would make special notes if I had made something that he wanted to eat more often, asking me to make it again the following week. As the months went on, I started seeing a pattern. If I had made anything Latin based, say, burritos or tacos or enchiladas he would request these same dishes again. At first, I would make an executive decision, thinking he must be getting sick of these same tacos, so I would make him something different. Then he would give me feedback asking for the original tacos I had been making for him weekly for months. He began doing this with all the meals until I was only making him Latin/Mexican dishes. He then started asking if I could make him something quick for a grab and go breakfast option and asked if I could make him breakfast burritos. I said of course and thus began his entire day of eating only Mexican style foods for breakfast, lunch and dinner. As time went on he became less concerned with eating healthy foods and much more happier eating copious amounts of cheese, beans and rice. This went on for another five years.
Then, out of the blue, he asked if we could take a break. I thought that I had finally bored his palette with all the same dishes year after year. But then, just as mysteriously as he had stopped wanting my service, he emailed me four months later asking me back. The email went something like this:
“Hey there Chef. I miss you and your meals. Would I be able to get back on your schedule? - Kumar”
I emailed him back and told him of course.
We set a day for me to begin cooking for him weekly. He said he wanted the last menu I had made him and to make an extra serving of each thing. I thought this was strange, but didn’t really question him. On the set day, I showed up with the usual makings for his pork asada burritos, turkey tacos, chicken enchiladas, Spanish chicken with rice, Spanish rice, refried beans, egg and cheese breakfast burritos, Southwestern chicken stew, and guacamole. I still had the garage code so I let myself in through the kitchen door in his garage. Upon entering I noticed things had massively changed in Kumar’s home.
First, there was way more furniture, art hung on the once barren walls, plants in the windows and the smell of the house was very much floral via incense or room spray. I couldn’t tell. But, what I could tell is that he had company in there now. Upon unpacking all the groceries I noticed photos on his refrigerator. There were family photos of him, his parents (who I had met a few times on their visits from India) and a beautiful young woman wearing fine silk sarees and laden with heavy gold jewelry. In one photo he was standing next to her, with flowers around both of their necks. I wondered what had happened. Then, the same woman walked into the kitchen and introduced herself as Satya, Kumar’s wife. He hadnt even mentioned any of this in the email, so I was a little thrown when she walked in.
“Oh, hello Satya! So nice to meet you. I’m Chef Shirlé, Kumar’s chef. I guess I’m your chef now, too”, I said with a big smile.
“Oh no. I will be cooking for myself. Kumar doesn’t really like how I cook and said he missed your food and wants me to try some”, she said solemnly while looking at the floor. I wasn’t sure how to respond as this instantly made me feel like I was his “food mistress” who feeds him.
I commented on how nice the house looked. She replied with a stern look and commented back to me that “he was living like a commoner and his mother had had enough of his bachelor lifestyle ways”, but she said, in a thick accent “That the one thing he refused to give up was having his chef cook for him. His mother is very angry at him as I am his wife now and should be cooking for him, but he likes your food more.” Again, a strange tug of feelings between pride in him liking the food I was making him as well as feeling like “the other woman”. I wasn’t sure how this whole set up was going to work. “Well, he asked me to make an extra portion of everything, I’m assuming for you to try?” I quickly said. Satya began walking into the living room while replying, “Yes, he wants me to like it, too.” I felt that she wasn’t going to really enjoy Kumars Mexican pleasures being made by his chef.
The following week Kumar emailed me saying that Satya wasn’t interested in his meals and that I should simply cook for him. The menu never changed as he was still ordering Latin inspired breakfasts, lunches and dinners. I cooked for him for another year, until his parents came to visit the couple.
His mother had put her foot down and demanded he stop this “nonsense” (his words in the parting email he finally sent me) of having a chef cook him meals when his wife should be the one cooking for him and that he should be eating traditional Indian meals. She had spoken and he had to listen. He did however write to me stating that if anything changed in his relationship that he would contact me immediately.
To this day, I imagine him tossing out the stackable tiffin container of lunch Satya lovingly made him and sneaking out of work to a local Mexican restaurant.