Becca Rea-Tucker - Baking by Feel

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO MY SWEET AND KIND HUSBAND, RHYS.

THE NUMBER OF DISHES HE WASHED IN SERVICE OF THIS BOOK IS ASTOUNDING.

I n the process of writing this book, I spent a lot of time researching a variety of resources about exploring our emotions. In the process, I discovered that there are a *lot* of books written for children about understanding their emotions (special shout-out to Madalena Monizs beautiful book Today I Feel... An Alphabet of Feelings). We recognize that an important part of a childs development is gaining the ability to identify, name, and understand emotions. As we get olderthough our emotions grow in nuance and complexitywe seem to think were done with this learning process. Yet, sometimes (quite often, really!) we grown-ups need some support to sort through our emotions too. Navigating the complex waters of our feelings is a lifelong process.

Of course, there are many books about feelings for adults as well, but in my experience the majority of them are focused on identifying emotions for the purpose of overcoming them or fixing them, rather than feeling them. With this framing, feelings become something to be handled rather than explored curiously. And if your goal is simply to handle your feelings, you can miss out on a ton of helpful stuff. Your feelings serve a multitude of purposes: to help you orient yourself in the world, to protect you, to guide you, and to connect you with other feeling-havers. Yes, theyre messy, but so what? To be clear, I am not a psychologist, therapist, or social worker. I am simply a human with a few decades of lived experience feeling (and also not feeling) my feelings. And, of course, an experienced baker!

Remember those super cool Choose Your Own Adventure books you read as a kid? This book is like a grown-ups-who-like-baking version of that genre. If at this moment youre like, What are you talking about, Ive never heard of those, think of this book as an interactive resource with some more structure (and excitement!) than your standard cookbook. Ive compiled a comprehensive list of feelings across the emotional spectrum and developed a recipe with each one in mind. Now heres where you come in: you can choose what to bake based on what youre feelingwhatever that is.

An important note: This book is emotionally agnostic. In other words: whatever youre feeling, its 100 percent OK. I dont think its very helpful to spend time sorting feelings into buckets of good or bad, for a variety of reasons. When we label a feeling as bad, we often wind up inadvertently shaming ourselves for experiencing it. When really, we have nothing to be ashamed of! And, if we spend a lot of time trying to ascertain whether a feeling is OK to experience, we might actually avoid feeling it.

I understand the impulse to avoid the feeling part of feelings, as someone who defaults to intellectualizing them. I can describe an emotion to you in perfect detail, like: the sharp embarrassment of losing the spelling bee in sixth grade by misspelling the word escalator in front of an auditorium full of people; the stinging heartache when someone who I thought was the love of my life (but turned out to just be my college boyfriend) suddenly broke up with me over FaceTime; or the fuzzy pride that came from relearning how to ride a bike at twenty-nine. But its much harder for me to fully experience those feelings. In fact, for the vast majority of my years earthside I didnt even know there was a difference between understanding and feeling. But once my (brilliant, wonderful) therapist gently pointed out the distinction, I set out to try to feel. Thats way easier said than done, of course, but Ive found that its more possible for me to experience and process my feelings while Im working with my hands. So, I do lots of creative things when I feel an emotion coming on. I knit, I make pasta, I garden, I make vision boards, and most of all, I bake.

In my grandmas house in Wichita, Kansas, there was always something homemade and sweet to snack on: chocolate chip cookies, ice cream cake, butterscotch pie. I grew up watching her bake. As a teenager, I started baking my own cakes from boxed mixes. As I grew more confident, I left the boxes behind and started baking from scratch, eventually developing my own recipes. I bake when Im happy, when I have a bad day, when Im looking for answers, and of course when its someones birthday.

Its common for people to use cooking and baking as an emotional outlet. During the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a widely publicized groundswell of interest in baking (remember the sourdough phase?), with cookbook and all-purpose flour sales spiking for months. Confined to their homes during a time of existential threat, a lot of people turned to baking for its therapeutic value. Baking can help us cope, and this book is designed to support you in that effort as you bake through all your feels.

I like to think of my recipes as approachable and a touch nostalgic. They are for the kinds of treats that your grandmother might have made, updated with some modern techniques, flavors, and twists. They are unfussy and flavor-focused. Im also a self-taught baker, so I totally get the need for clear instructions that incorporate sensory cues, like work the butter into the flour mixture with your fingertips until the largest pieces are the size of black beans! In this book, I will encourage you to trust yourself and bake by sight, smell, taste, and emotion. Im talking literally baking by feel.

For the past few years, Ive been saying it with sugar by decorating cakes with feminist (defined broadly!) messages and posting them on the internet as The Sweet Feminist.

I hit upon a variety of topicsfrom voting rights, to street harassment, to abortion access. In the beginning, it was an anonymous project. As I grew more confident in my voice, I added my name to it. Over time, I became more and more visible in my work: vulnerabilities, dreams, wins, and losses. Its an honest reflection of my own life, both the sweet and salty! When I started the project, I knew that Id be sharing my voice with others. What I didnt expect was how many people would share their voices with me! Through my work as The Sweet Feminist, people have offered up their joys, pains, worries, and experiences. Im continually in awe of the abundance of genuine and authentic humans who exist in the world, and their willingness to connect over shared (or sometimes differing!) experiences. Also, the near universal love of cake.

I decided to write Baking by Feel because it was what I needed. But I wrote it as if I were talking (and offering some gentle advice) to my best friend. Its based on the firm belief that you are wonderful and worthy of care in all of your emotional realities and moods. Your complexity deserves to be seen and appreciated! I hope this book helps you celebrate your joys, untangle your big and small challenges, and see yourself more clearly. I also hope it helps you learn how to whip up a batch of Swiss buttercream so easily youll be pretty sure you could do it with your eyes closed.

This book is for you, whatever youre feeling today.