I’m a baker, not a cook. I find comfort in baking’s precise rules and reliable outcomes. If I sift together just the right amount of powdered sugar, cocoa powder, and eggs, if I refrigerate the dough overnight and take the tray out of the oven a few minutes early, the flourless chocolate cookies will melt in your mouth. If I follow my mother’s adjustments and increase the cinnamon in her berry pie recipe from one teaspoon to one tablespoon and the lemon juice from one tablespoon to two, the pie will crumble irresistibly. I can depend on these results. If I respect the rules, there are rarely surprises.

In contrast, I’ve never felt comfortable with the improvisation associated with cooking. I don’t want to be responsible for inventing flavor pairings, I don’t trust myself to add spices “to taste.” I’ve never understood how restaurant cooks make the dishes come out the exact same every time. I’m better as a sous chef; having grown up with the kitchen as the center of the household, I learned to chop for salads and stir fries and trays of roasted potatoes. Put the cutting board in front of me, give me a size, and I’ll make it happen.

So, it was an amusing epiphany a few years ago when I realized there are recipes for savory items, too, and I could become a better cook by using them — just because we think of cooking as more improvisational doesn’t mean I need to pull every dinner plan out of thin air. My cousin kindly shared her subscription to The New York Times cooking app, and I made a folder for “Rachel’s recipes to make.” I saved reels on Instagram, trying to discern which recipes would actually turn out like they looked in the videos. I aimed to cook a new recipe at least once per week. A white bean stew made it into my repertoire, as did a gochujang peanut sauce. An eggplant, tofu, soba noodle recipe taught me that I don’t like rice vinegar because I find it overpowers all other flavors. A homemade tomato sauce was a fun accomplishment for dinner with a friend — look, it’s not from a jar! I simmered those tomatoes! — but I haven’t made time to repeat it since.

Through these recipes, I steadily became more comfortable adding a dash of this or that, less nervous when a friend extends a spoon of in-progress salad dressing or marinade and asks, “What does this need?” Today, I can respectably roast and sauté. No one has quite complimented my red lentil soup the way they compliment my banana muffins, but I’ve become a more confident cook. The recipes have nudged me to learn while providing the safety of an already-established framework.

However, being a rule-follower doesn’t square with my worldview. Outside of my baking hobby, I’m a law student and prison abolitionist and immigration advocate because I want to break the rules and build new systems. Paul Butler, a former prosecutor turned prison abolitionist, emphasizes that abolition is about imagination. It’s about imagining a world without police, prisons, or ICE, one in which people have access to the resources that let us live with dignity and safety — such as quality housing, education, employment, and healthcare — and in which accountability mechanisms to address harm are rehabilitative rather than punitive. In other words, a world with a completely transformed set of rules built on solidarity and accountability rather than greed and exploitation. In this sense, I’m eager to think beyond the current reality and envision a world without racial capitalism or prisons, a world with open borders and a free Palestine, because it’s the world I want to live in.

When I decided to pursue immigration law, I started asking immigration lawyers about their experiences working under Trump 1.0. Nearly all of them cited creativity and determination as the most important skills they developed. Their goals remained the same — providing the best possible direct representation for their clients — but the policies changed around them by the day. They had to be creative, to build new arguments that would help clients win asylum claims or convince judges to dismiss removal proceedings. They had to stay up-to-date with shifting policies in order to provide sound counsel. Now, in my summer legal internship for immigrants’ rights, the lawyers say that Trump 2.0 is ten times worse because everything is changing by the hour. They constantly consult each other, pooling knowledge to answer questions like, “Should my client attend their immigration hearing, or is ICE conducting arrests at immigration court?”

And so I find myself reflecting on legal rules. What does it mean to follow them when showing up to a mandated court hearing might mean ICE detention and a family torn apart? What does it mean to follow them when the system is designed to uphold white supremacy and, for example, asylum applications reinforce racist stereotypes about less-developed countries? On the other hand, what does it mean to follow them when that’s the best way to prevent a client from being deported?

It feels complicated to be a law student who doesn’t revere the legal system. I’ve chosen the law as my tool for now, focusing on how to use it for non-reformist reforms — the kind that challenge existing power structures rather than reinforcing them. My hope is that I can represent individual clients in their court proceedings while also shifting collective power to immigrants, workers, and people of color. But even so, I’m under no illusion that the law will save us. So, I’ll support community organizing. I’ll take to the streets to protest the genocide of Palestinians and ICE’s efforts to convert a closed-down federal prison into an immigration detention center. I’ll plug into rapid response networks and mutual aid efforts. What I’m trying to say is, I’ll keep challenging the rules.

When I reflect on why I find comfort in some rules but not others — beyond just labeling some as good/innocuous and others as bad/malicious — I think the answer lies in whether those rules are rooted in and serve community.

For example, one of my mother’s love languages is feeding people, and I grew up watching her bring people together over food. The goal was to be joyous, and full, and together. The communities I want to be part of also come together over food, cooking dinner and sharing wine and lingering for hours in conversation. These gatherings rejuvenate me, and I, of course, want the food at them to be nourishing and delicious. That’s why I follow the recipe for the olive oil lemon bars and the peanut butter miso cookies, so they come out just right.

But the political rules are not working for our communities. The government keeps investing in genocide abroad while divesting from poor and working-class communities in the United States. Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” slashes healthcare coverage and food benefits while ramping up immigration enforcement and detention center capacity. Those are rules I want to fight against alongside my community.

The analogy is not as neat as I’m making it out to be. People’s lives are at stake with immigration policy, Trump’s funding cuts, and the genocide against the Palestinian people. As I write this, Israel is imposing mass starvation in Gaza, blocking aid and attacking Palestinians seeking food. I continue grappling with how to use legal tools to minimize harm in the short-term and to bring about systemic change in the long-term. I do know we need joy, and togetherness, and energy to change the racist, classist systems around us. Maybe, for me, it does start with a recipe. Maybe baking dessert with recipes provides the stabilizing foundation I need. Maybe cooking with recipes pushes me to then step out of my comfort zone and measure less, experiment more. Maybe learning from and alongside community organizers and liberation movements will help me understand how to best wield the law for change. Maybe recipes are about discovering which rules are made to be followed and which we need to reject and transform.