Perfect ingredients: Use this baker's approach to make your life more delicious
Billie-jo Picco likes to bake.
I mean, she really, really likes to bake. As in "just make a few cheesecakes in the evening before bed" likes to bake. Or "was on MasterChef Canada 2014" likes to bake.
In her day job, Picco is a licensed practical nurse with Eastern Health, but in her free time she makes custom cheesecakes for friends, family, and for customers from her "She Bakes" Facebook page.
While the rest of us might think it would be stressful to regularly prepare up to 10 different kinds of cheesecakes in a given week, for Picco it's the perfect way to relax. Baking lets her focus on a single project, put all of her skills to good use, and take some time to fully concentrate.
Maybe you don't plan to start baking cheesecakes but you can use her general approach to making delicious cheesecakes and apply it in your own life.
Narrow your choices
Picco has a huge variety of flavours that she likes to make, but she narrows the selection to what she sees as a doable number — 10 kinds. She has her own methods for choosing the flavours of the week.
"Sometimes, I'll have my headphones in and I go for a walk and I might smell something that inspires me, or see something that makes me reminisce," Picco said. "And I love making combinations of flavours into something new."
In addition to being inventive, Picco is also responsive to external ideas.
"It can depend on the weather, too," she said.
"In the fall it will be all like the pumpkin patch. If we've had a lot of rain, drizzle and fog, I'll choose chocolate, salted caramel, the comfort flavours. When it's nice out, I'll probably have things like white chocolate raspberry shortcake."
How can you use this?
You have lots of things you could do but your time is finite. The only way to have any sense of satisfaction with how you spend your days is to make choices about what you will do with the time you have. (Having more things on your to-do list doesn't change your capacity to actually do them.) You can use whatever criteria work best for you, but knowing in advance what you will do with your time will help you make the most of it.
Do your prep work
After she has decided what cheesecakes to make, Picco does her pre-baking preparations. She ensures that she has time to make the things she wants to make and gets her ingredients ready, and then follows the methods that are proven to work.
"You just can't just throw everything together and throw it in the oven. You have to organize everything," Picco said.
"You put everything out and you have to have enough time to do it right. For example, you can't use anything cold; everything has to be at room temperature."
By getting everything ready beforehand, Picco helps to ensure that the cheesecake will turn out the way she wants it to.
How can you use this?
Your work may not have to be at room temperature and you probably don't have to prepare any of your ingredients, but for most of us, there will be a little preparation required before your work can be done.
Make sure you have the supplies and equipment you need, be clear on your procedures before you begin, and make a choice about where you are going to start. If you can do all of that before you actually start your work, you will be more productive with your work time and things will proceed more smoothly.
Focus on the project in front of you, take the time it needs
Like everyone else, Picco has a lot on her mind. But in the chaos of day-to-day life, she takes solace in baking because it requires her full concentration.
"I love being in the kitchen. It keeps me sane. My life is so chaotic but I can concentrate when I'm baking because everything only happens in its own time." Picco says. "You have to stick with it and do all the pieces in the right order. And you can't rush it. It's still chaos but it's an organized chaos."
The organized chaos of baking brings her peace.
"You're not thinking about everything else. You have a recipe that's in front of you, you have a list of seven different things, you have seven different steps to follow," Picco said.
"You don't need to worry about the dishes in the sink at the moment, or any of the other things you need to do. You can just focus on those seven steps and it will give you a peaceful half hour."
Picco is also amused by the fact that, after the effort of baking it, you have to wait 24 hours to eat the cheesecake you made. She says it's a practice in patience and in letting things take the time they need to take.
Taking an inventory of the things we know that we do well can help us to build confidence in our work and our processes.
How can you use this?
No matter how many things you have on your plate, you can literally only work on one thing at a time. And that thing is going to take the time that it takes. Trying to multitask or to rush things usually just ends with you feeling flustered and your task half-done.
So, rather than trying to multitask, can you choose to focus on that one thing for even a short amount of time?
If you're used to having your attention scattered, this will take some practice, so you may want to start with short periods of time. Say to yourself, "For 10 minutes, I will only work on this thing. If any other ideas pop up, I will write them down but I won't switch tasks." With practice, you will build up your concentration.
Unlike Picco's cheesecakes, most of your tasks probably won't need to be set aside for 24 hours to be fully ready. However, there are lots of projects that will be easier to revise or improve if you give yourself a little time away from them and come back with fresh eyes. When you can, give yourself a little time between work sessions and see if it helps.
Get experience and then trust your expertise
Picco has been baking for more than 25 years. At this point, she has a sort of intuition about the process and she trusts herself to know what to do.
"I don't even measure anymore. I know exactly what goes in without having to measure," Picco said. "I know when my cheesecake is done by the smell. I don't even have to time things anymore. If it's a chaotic day, I'll time it because I have things on the go but nine times out of 10, I can tell my the smell or the look of it. I don't have to touch it or time it."
How can you use this?
In the time of Facebook and Instagram, there are so many opportunities to compare ourselves to others that we can lose sight of our own skills and abilities. It's easy to doubt ourselves and spend a lot of time second-guessing our approach and our decisions.
Taking an inventory of the things we know that we do well can help us to build confidence in our work and our processes. Making note of our efforts as well as our successes can show us that we can have confidence in our abilities, especially our ability to learn and grow.
Don't make light of the skills you have, the things you can do without thinking too much about them. You might even benefit from remembering the challenges you faced in first learning those skills. That way you have a reminder that the work challenges you face now will one day come to you more easily.
In the jumble of our daily lives, borrowing Billie-jo Picco's baking philosophy can help you approach your to do list with more focus and clarity. There is peace and ease to be found in narrowing your choices, doing your prep work, focusing on the project in front of you, and trusting your expertise.
Even if you can't take on the whole thing at once, remembering that you can only do one thing at time — no matter how long your list is — can make a big difference in your life.
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