Fun In The Kitchen With Kimbal Musk

This picture was from 2015 so of course I look a lot younger!

Sometimes I shake my head with wonder at my strange and crazy life, much of which seems random, but other times magical. My friendship with Kimbal is a magical one.

It all started when friends thought we should meet because we both love cooking, farming, and gardening. I was in Boulder on business, so we had breakfast together and proceeded to have a polite argument about the best way to roast a chicken. He said olive oil and salt. I said nothing, just stick the bird in the oven. I thought I’d never hear from him again.

But soon he invited himself out to visit the Rodale Institute, so I invited him over for dinner to taste my roast chicken. We then proceeded to have a polite argument about gravy versus jus. I am firmly, religiously in the gravy camp. He’s a jus guy. (Jus is a fancy word for the natural juices that come out of the chicken when roasting. Gravy involves cooking those juices with a mixture of flour and water —GF flour for me.) Again, I thought I’d never hear from him again.

Shortly thereafter he called to invite me to a private, chemical farming conference in Iowa. This, my friends, was a dream come true for me! To stealthily observe “the other side” of the farming world? Of course, nerd that I am I said YES. We decided to make it a three-day trip through Iowa visiting chemical and organic farms. I had only one condition: That I got to drive the car. He could control the radio, I told him. He said okay.

This began the most interesting, fun, enlightening, hilarious, and ridiculous road trip that only years later would I realize how rare it is to have Kimbal strapped in and under one’s control for three days straight. We started by visiting a conventional farmer who had a large corn-soy rotation high-tech farm and a small confined pig operation. We were scared to see the pigs after witnessing the truly happy organic pigs at the Rodale Institute. This one pig ran over to look me in the eye as if to say “Look at this! Look what they are doing to us!” The farmer we visited had a son who wanted to transition to organic, but his father was skeptical and resistant. It was sad.

This pig still haunts me.

At the farming conference, we discovered that many “farmers” in Iowa are the widows of farmers who hire management companies to farm their land for profit. But those widows were sweet and told us about a local fair on the way to our next destination. At that fair, we joined a sunflower spitting contest. Kimbal won, but only because I misunderstood the goal. I went for distance, but the prize was awarded for accuracy. But I did spit farther. Spitting sunflower seeds is fun.

We were invited to a farm fresh dinner with an illustrious group of organic farmers and leaders, hosted by the generous Neil Hamilton and his lovely wife. There we learned that La Quercia prosciutto was made nearby. The next day we visited and witnessed the processing accompanied by the sound of loud opera music. It was glorious and delicious. We then stopped to visit Francis Thicke, the dedicated organic dairy farmer. We spent the day with him and somehow ended up at Maharishi University. Iowa is wonderfully weird!

Neil Hamilton in his organic garden

Kimbal and Francis Thicke with his organic dairy products.

Making prosciutto the right way…with opera music!

We ended our trip together at Kimbal’s restaurant The Kitchen, in Chicago, where we had a fantastic, delicious, and delightful meal, after which we went our separate ways. My insights were that the chemical farmers were so fixated on minute details of production aimed at profits that they were unwilling to see the broader impact of their actions on the soil, environment, and health. In fact, seeing those impacts would mean acknowledging being wrong, which men in general seem reluctant to do. Although their younger kids were pushing for change, which was a relief to see. Except that many of the farm kids didn’t want to farm anymore, hence farm management companies.

My other insight was that organic farmers and producers have way more fun! They are happier with their choices, with their lives, and with the bounty of their land. That’s not to say organic farming is easy, but it is more filled with joy.

By the way, I only made one slight driving mistake, which caused no harm but made Kimbal scream like a girl, which honestly I still laugh about to myself once a month or so (and multiple times while writing this post). We laughed a lot on that trip.

Here’s the thing: Kimbal and I both come from somewhat famous families and are both successful in our own right. We know the feeling of people wanting things from us (money, access). But we also know that true joy comes from following our own passions, which Kimbal has done with his restaurants, especially the original Kitchen in Boulder, Colorado. Kimbal loves to cook. He loves everything about cooking, from growing and sourcing the food to gathering friends and family together around the table. He also knows the power of good food to bring peace and nourishment in times of stress and need. Trust me, read the intro to his new cookbook The Kitchen Cookbook, Cooking For Your Community. He has a gift.

A few years ago we made Paella together, which is a favorite food of ours. I learned so much from him — little details he learned from his classical chef training and experience. I’m not sure if he learned anything from me, but for whatever reason he seems to like hanging out with me. Probably because we both love to laugh and I am not afraid to disagree with him. Although he is so tall (6’4”) and I am so short (5’2”) that I much prefer when we hang out together sitting down in a quiet place where we can both hear each other because I don’t know if you know this but as you get older it sometimes gets harder to hear people in noisy places.

Buy his book! You’ll learn something and have fun doing it. The main thing I learned from Kimbal, though, is to say yes to adventure and new things. Say yes to joy and laughter, when you are doing good things for a good cause, and even when things get super hard. Say yes to being honest and disagreeing with someone but agree that differences are good. That doesn’t mean life is always fun and happy. No matter how much money you have, things still happen that cause pain and heartache. You, dear reader, probably don’t read or know the real truth about any of our lives unless you hear it directly from us. That’s why I’m so happy Kimbal finally wrote his cookbook. His heart, and his story, is good.

Still laughing and cooking in the kitchen after all these years. (And yes, I had a sunburn.)

Kimbal also started a wonderful non-profit that brings gardening and food to kids in schools. It’s an incredible organization called Big Green. Check it out!

Also, March 19th is Plant A Seed Day. Don’t forget to plant something! And then, don’t forget to cook something and eat it, even if it’s just for you.

Trust the magic!