Bee Wilson was bereft when her marriage suddenly ended after 22 years. But solace came from meatballs, eggy bread and her most beloved meals. She talks to four other people who pieced themselves back together with food
The day after my husband first said he didn’t love me any more, I made a Nigella recipe for parmesan french toast: big wodges of white bread soaked in egg with parmesan, dijon mustard and Worcestershire sauce, fried in butter to a deep golden brown. It reminded me of the “eggy bread” my mother would make when I was a child. The week after that, having told our children their dad was leaving, I made meatballs from the Falastin cookbook by Sami Tamimi and Tara Wigley. It’s fiddly but worth it. Each meatball is sandwiched between slices of roasted aubergine and tomato, with a rich tomato sauce on top followed by torn basil leaves after it comes out of the oven. I served the meatballs with a big pot of coarse bulgur wheat cooked with bay leaves, which is one of my carbs of choice when I am feeling fragile. I’ve been eating a lot of bulgur lately.
People talk about “comfort food” as if it were a kind of trivial indulgence. But this is missing the point. True comfort food isn’t sticky toffee pudding on a cosy night in, or sausages and mash on a crisp cold night. It’s the deeply personal flavours and textures you turn to when life has punched you in the gut. Comfort food should really be called trauma food. It’s what you cook and eat to remind you you’re alive when you are not entirely sure this is true. At least, this is how it has been for me.
