Cook how and where you want to
Dear Prudence,
Eight years ago, my partner and I bought our first home together in one of the few affordable neighborhoods left in our (blue) city in a (mostly red) state. We love to cook, and over the years, we enjoyed learning from our neighbors’ traditional cuisines and sharing ours. I will be the first to admit that I am prejudiced against MAGA folks. And I guess our brand-new neighbors are fairly low-key (bumper stickers rather than MAGA hats and Confederate flags). We made our introductions to “Michael” and “Cheyla.”
It was pretty cordial for about two weeks. Then the complaints (always from Michael—Cheyla is apparently too delicate to voice her feelings—yep, I’m judging it) started coming in about “smells” and “noise” from our backyard during weekly (over by 9 p.m. at the latest, we’re OLD) cookouts. I took reasonable steps (moved music indoors to keep voices down, moved my small compost heap to the far side of the yard, etc.) But Michael’s newest complaint is that even cooking in our kitchen is making Cheyla sick.
According to him, she’s “allergic to alliums” and the onions, garlic, and shallots that we use regularly are giving her digestive issues. I read up on allium allergies, and I suspect that what she’s “allergic” to is the presence of people who don’t look like her in her new neighborhood. But even giving them the benefit of the doubt: They need to reinforce their home, right? I mean, we can’t realistically be expected to cook differently to appease a new neighbor?
—Flavor Racists Next Door
Re: Cook how and where you want to
Our neighbor constantly smokes a lot of weed 5 feet from our bedroom window. She also hacks up a lung most of the time. Is it annoying as shit? Yeah, for sure. But I’m not going to tell her she can’t smoke in her own backyard.
If this were true, IDK, call me a b!tch, but if it's not someone I care for, not someone I live with, and I'm not cooking for, I'm not taking their allergies into consideration. I'd just smile, nod, say, "I'll see what I can do" and move on with life.
She has extreme sensitivities to things like Perfluorinated Chemicals (PFCs) which are in a LOT of products. Like fabric softeners.
Any time her neighbor uses a fabric softener in the dryer, the PFCs they emit wafts into her house and makes her sick. The smell does also, which is her warning to close the windows and stop the a/c until they are done with their laundry.
As much as she hates it, she knows she can't ask people to stop using fabric softener in their own home.