Spicy Salmon Rice Bowls + Bringing PLAY into the Kitchen
Happy Friday! Today I’m sharing a recipe for spicy salmon rice bowls. I could eat this meal single day for the rest of my life and die happy. Seriously. It’s a cinch to make featuring tamari-ginger roasted salmon, sushi rice, some crunchy veggies and not one but two sauces (you know how much I love my sauces!). It’s a meal that invites play. Speaking of which, while last week I talked about pleasure, today let’s dive into play, and how we can bring more of it into the kitchen.
[On a separate note before we jump in, I was honored to have recently been a guest on the In Kinship Podcast, where I share my career journey as well as my creative process. You can listen here!]
Do adults play?
I was at the playground last week with my eight-year-old, and it was one of those rare winter days when the sun feels magnificent and warm. Kids were shedding their coats and racing around—jumping, imagining, and simply playing. They embodied pure freedom and joy (or, in the case of one little boy who was saving the world from imploding, serious heroism). It got me thinking about how much I play in my life. Hmm, like, hardly ever?
But as I sat with it, I realized that as an adult, play looks different than it did as a kid. My husband and I don’t imagine we’re MacGyver trying to stop a bomb from detonating and destroying our house, like my brothers and I did growing up. But there are moments of play—of being fully in my body and letting my creativity lead the show instead of the calculations and rationalizations of my mind. This most often looks like uninhibitedly dancing by myself or with my people, doing art with my kids, skipping through the woods, and yes, at times, cooking.
So how can we bring more play into the kitchen?
One way we can invite more play into the kitchen is to let go of control. Playing feels so free because we detach from the mind’s need to control, allowing us to tap into our creativity.
Many of us seek control in the kitchen, whether that be in how we’re cooking (rigidly following recipes), in monitoring what we’re eating (you can hear how I used food as form of control while experiencing disordered eating as a young adult in this podcast), or in trying to control what other people are eating.
For example, when my kids were little I thought it was my job to control what foods they consumed. I would plate up everybody’s meal because it would “ensure” that my kids would eat the “proper foods” (not effective). As a trained chef I also had very specific ideas about what foods should pair with what (oh the dreaded ketchup battle of 2014). The result was that the kids often didn’t want to eat what was on their “perfect” plates, and I’d end up feeling frustrated or even personally offended.
The kitchen became a battleground, and a stressful one at that. There was absolutely no play to be had. At some point when Juni was a toddler I finally hit a wall. While these days we know that giving kids freedom around food is how they learn to trust their bodies and become intuitive eaters, back then the literature wasn’t there. I was learning in real time.
I stopped plating food and forcing my kids to eat it (our rule was, and is, that they have to taste everything, but they get to choose what to eat). I started letting the kids serve themselves. I granted Ella, who had (and still has) a major sweet tooth, full access to the candy stash (that one was admittedly hard for me to do). It wasn’t until I relinquished control that we were able to find peace at the table again.
Finding freedom
When I began granting the kids freedom over food, I found more freedom too.Yes, it was a messy, imperfect process, but dinnertime slowly became our very favorite part of the day as a family. The experience even sparked the seed for my book, Build-a-Bowl, as I found that build-your-own-bowls were an easy way to satisfy everybody.
Back to play
But back to play. When I think about the family meals that have felt the most playful and fun, it’s when we’re all engaged, serving ourselves and eating in a way that feels joyful to us as individuals.
Play looks a bit different for each of us. I still love crafting beautiful bowls of food (just for me and James, not the kids) because the process of layering different colors and textures helps me tap into my creativity and feels like an art project. James has the most fun when meals are full of discourse and storytelling. For the girls, it’s when they’re fully hands-on, literally getting their hands dirty either through helping to cook or in eating with their hands.
Take these salmon bowls, for instance. The kids actually ditch the bowls (and silverware!) and make sushi instead. They’ll be rolling and assembling at the table while James and I are happily drizzling sauce over everything (did I mention there are two sauces?). We play music. The kitchen will get messy. And, yes, it will feel chaotic if I let it. But as long as I remind myself to let go of the need for control and just flow, then guess what? It feels like play.
Here are some more easy ways to invite play into the kitchen:
Get embodied. Play happens in the body, not in the mind. Engage all your senses and feel your body as you cook.
Let go of expectations. When we’re focused on how we want a meal to look or taste, we lose access to the present moment. Play isn’t something that happens in the past or future, but right now. Cook for the process, enjoying the full experience of your senses. Don’t worry about how it’s going to turn out. Seriously.
Play music. Music can make a party out of anything. Bump it up. (p.s. wooden spoons make for excellent microphones, just saying.)
Let people serve themselves. What goes on their plates is not your business (even if they insist on dipping the $30 halibut into ketchup). Grant your people the freedom to serve themselves—you’ll find more freedom too.
Eat with your hands. Eating with your hands is messy and interactive and just plain fun. Feed yourself with joy.
Think of your plate like an art project. If design is your thing, then tap into your creativity when building your plate or bowl. Let it be an impermanent art installation, not for anybody else’s eyes, but for your own pleasure. (p.s. pretty things are more fun to eat.)
Cook without a recipe. I love playing a game I call, “what can I create with the leftovers in the fridge?” and my daughter Ella often bakes cakes without recipes. When you cook without a recipe, you open up to creativity. Yes, there will be fails, but as long as you let go of expectations, it can be pretty damn fun.
How do you play in the kitchen? Let me know in the comments!
Spicy salmon rice bowls
These bowls have become one of our family’s favorite dinners because we all get to play in our own way. The recipe was inspired by the rice bowls at Barrique Wine Bar in Lake Geneva, WI, where I ate this past fall with my mom and sisters-in-law during a weekend getaway. We ended up going twice for lunch because we loved the rice bowls so much. Their version uses raw fish (which you can absolutely use here), which was drizzled with sriracha aioli, but they also serve a tamari-based sauce to drizzle over everything. The combination of the creamy-spicy sauce with the salty-umami-based sauce was divine.
I created my own version of the bowls the moment I got home, making a tamari sauce with toasted sesame oil, ginger and maple syrup for balance. The sauce does double duty—it’s also used to glaze salmon fillets (which are roasted for ease). Crunchy raw cucumbers and radishes, creamy avocado, and sticky sushi rice round out the meal. We also tuck in store-bought seaweed snacks, and, as I mentioned, the kids ditch the bowls completely and make sushi instead (here’s how to do it without a sushi mat!).
The result is an easy but dynamic meal that makes everybody happy. You can watch how the bowl comes together in this video. I’ve included a printable PDF of the recipe here and pasted JPEG images at the bottom of this page.
Let me know in the comments if you give the bowls a try, and/or if you have any questions! Wishing you a weekend filled with play, and remember to nourish yourself with intention and love.
xo, Nicki
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