One Potato, Two Potato

*A new series of occasional posts in which I recount a desperate attempt to do something (usually culinary), that I can no longer really do because of the impact of my MS. With often disastrous consequences.

This ahead of schedule extra bonus post for the month of July might just be a distraction from what I was supposed to be writing about: do I take a new MS medication, or not? But why get bogged down in a cost-benefit analysis of potentially slowing down disease progression versus not insignificant side effects, when you can wang on about the pitfalls of making your own potato salad from scratch? Siponimod you can wait a few more weeks.

This potato salad episode all started with an unused bag of new potatoes in the fridge veg drawer, with no apparent destiny.

I really hate to waste food.

And some friends were coming for a barbecue later in the day.

Before Jason pretty much took the cooking reins from me when MS problems came calling, I almost always made meals from scratch. Pizza (the dough, the tomato sauce, everything except pressing my own mozzarella), coq au vin, curries, mini cottage pies for our daughter when she was small, chocolate brownies. Shirley Conran had a point when she famously said that life was too short to stuff a mushroom, but once or twice I even filled my own home-made pasta with ricotta and spinach. I relished “bringing Yorkshire Puddings triumphant to the table” à la Nigella in “How To Eat”. My Sunday Roast gravy became ‘Jane Harrison’s gravy’ after making it on a weekend away with friends. I even had a very short lived home-baking business (one order, one client!) It closed immediately due to the onset of Covid restrictions the day after my first delivery.

I’m not sure when this fondness for making food started. My lovely friend Jane (who also named the gravy) still to this day tells the story from post-university flat-sharing times; that I ‘couldn’t even make baked beans on toast without adorning them with chopped parsley’. I swear that never happened. But it gives you the idea of the cooking vibe I effected.

Perhaps I’m romanticising a little, but I don’t recall cooking ever being a chore. I loved it all. It felt creative, and relaxing.

It’s hard to let go of something you loved. Something that’s a part of you. It’s a loss I still grieve.

Hence the potato salad.

The saga began innocently enough. Sitting outside in my garden with a coffee on a relatively cool late morning in the recent heatwave, I spotted the mint, in my herb patch, waving at me in the breeze. Until that point, I wasn’t committed to making the potato salad. It only existed as a vague plan in my head. I hadn’t told a soul so I wouldn’t be letting anyone down if I decided against it. But oh, if I could pick that mint, and boil the potatoes in it, what a beautiful start that would be.

I was off.

I lined up my rollator along the side of the raised bed, and leaned in using the handle of the mobility aid for balance. I picked the herb, breathing in the sweet smell of its leaves. I trundled back inside.

The next step I knew would be the trickiest. It’s not safe for me to try to fill, lift and hold a heavy pan of water from the tap, so instead I filled the saucepan in stages from a bottle. I’d already washed the mint and potatoes. Thankfully as the potatoes were small, only a few of the bigger ones needed cutting in half. I could just about do this. My limited dexterity in my left hand rules most chopping out of the equation, especially when the fingers on that side are needed for holding an item in place.

🧄Garlic and onions? These days I buy frozen, pre-chopped.

🍞Slicing bread? Dangerous.

🥑Avocados? Hahaha.

🥕Peeling vegetables? No chance. It’s why more often than not I buy these potatoes, they don’t need peeling. In the case of the potato salad, their fine papery skins would add a nice rustic texture.

But I was already getting fatigued. I had been standing up for far longer than I should. I always underestimate just how many steps there are in preparing food, something I would never have considered in my pre-MS days. I went to sit on the sofa while the pan bubbled merrily away until the potatoes were done.

Up again. As I stood there contemplating how I might drain the potatoes, Jase came in from the office. Magic. Not used to seeing me behind a curtain of cooking steam these days, his look was one of gentle bewilderment.

🙎🏻‍♂️“What are you up to?”

💁🏻‍♀️”Just making potato salad. For the BBQ.”

🙎🏻‍♂️“Oh!” He knew what it was going to cost.

🙎🏻‍♂️“Anything I can do?”

🤷🏻‍♀️“Bring me a chair?” I had been sitting down intermittently on my rollator seat and useful as that is, a chair would be steadier.

🙍🏻‍♀️“Erm… and draining the potatoes would be a massive help.” I no longer had to work on that conundrum. “And running them under the cold tap please.”

After he’d done the tasks I'd requested and gone back to work, I continued on my mission. I chopped (stabbed at with my right hand, occasionally bringing in the scissors) some spring onions and chives. The pieces were bigger than I wanted. Only this all took its toll. My body was stiff. Everywhere. I was about to hit a wall of fatigue from where I might not return. Leaving the potatoes to cool fully I returned to the sofa, recognising a teachable moment when I saw one. I did not need to do this kind of thing any more. Right now though there was no going back.

Dragging myself back for the home straight, I stirred crème fraiche and plain yogurt in a large bowl. In the manner of a tired and lost wanderer clearing a path through jungle undergrowth with a machete, I hacked the minty potatoes into slightly smaller chunks with a kitchen knife. Nearly there. I mixed everything together with generous seasoning. I tasted the mixture. Was it lacking flavour? At this point I was past caring.

Knowing this quest had rendered my ability to carry out any of the other barbecue duties to zero, I now had guilt to add to my hit list of emotions. Jase loves doing the barbecue (of course he does), but the extra prep can sometimes make it burdensome. So, on my last legs and brain reserves, I saved him the job of washing the colander, relieving it of stray potato skins. At least the green salad would have a clean start. But my fuddled head and hand turned the tap on too far, and as my foot started to feel wet I realised that I was slowly flooding the kitchen. I was supposed to be at the finish line by now, but instead created another job that I couldn’t finish. I threw on some tea towels to soak up the water. Jase would deal with that later.

The potato salad chilled in the fridge. Told by Jase that I was doing no more from this point than enjoying the evening, I slumped on the sofa. My mind ticked over.

How had a side dish become the main event? The answer was clear. Although I have adjusted in leaps and bounds to accept the limitations that this condition places upon me, sometimes I forget. With no cure for MS on the horizon, I’m sure I have already cooked my last full family Christmas dinner. My desire to do, even small things that are important to me sometimes exceeds my capabilities. I guess the real growth would be in feeling that I don’t need to contribute anything at all to a food gathering, other than myself. I don’t think I'll get there.

Our friends arrived, bearing fizz, burgers and tiramisu.

Jase delegated salad chopping and assembling from his long and weary list of jobs.

I related my kitchen tale of woe.

Despite my recipe for disaster, we had a really lovely evening.

😉And everyone agreed; it was the best potato salad they had ever tasted.

You’d like the recipe? Of course:

Ingredients.

🥔1kg new/baby potatoes

🪴A few sprigs of mint

🌱A bunch of spring onions

🌿A few handfuls of chives

🥣1 300g tub crème fraiche

🥄A few tablespoons of plain Greek yogurt

🧂Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method

1. Boil potatoes (skin on) in salted water with mint until cooked through (about 20 mins). Rinse with cold water and allow to fully cool.***

2. Chop spring onions and chives.

3. Combine the crème fraiche and yogurt in a large bowl.

4. Add the potatoes, onions and chives to the bowl and mix well.

5. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

6. Chill for a few hours before serving.

7. Note to self - if there’s a next time, make it the day before, or simply buy from Waitrose.

*I know everyone said it was the best potato salad but I think if I did it again (will I ever learn?) I would add a little mustard and white wine vinegar or lemon. Maybe even some chopped gherkins. See, I can’t help it.

**If you’re a big fan of mayonnaisey potato salad you might find this one a bit plain tasting.

*** Alternatively try ‘trapped’ potatoes (tinned, pre-cooked) – joke stolen from Bob Mortimer in BBC’s “Gone Fishing”.

All this recipe talk brings to mind a couple of excellent Substacks that are all about cooking with a chronic illness, and accessible nutrition. I would recommend checking them out for hacks, tips and properly easy recipes.

🍏Gourmet Spoonie ( Gourmet Spoonie (he/him) )

🍎The Nutrition D-List ( Dina Young )

And I also must mention Chris L Vaughan whose fabulous Substack about parenting with a disability also contains some really helpful posts on adaptive kitchenware like the one below. (Further note to self - invest in some of these devices.)

Thank you for reading.

Jane 💛