Four hours, one pot, zero multitasking. The sauce knew when I was distracted. Sauces always know.
A pot does not reward speed. There is nothing to optimise, no setting that makes it faster, no way to be efficient about something that takes an afternoon.
What it asks for is company. Stirring, smelling, tasting, waiting, and being in the kitchen while it happens. That is the opposite of multitasking: one place, slowly, on purpose.
Half-attention has a cost. The sauce still works. You taste none of it, and you look up at seven o’clock wondering where the afternoon went.
There is a reason restaurant kitchens shout and home kitchens do not have to. Speed is fine when somebody else is paying for it. At home the clock is yours, and a pot is a decent place to put an afternoon.
Cooking is one of the few things left that cannot be done faster without turning into a different thing. Bread, stock, a proper onion. They all refuse. Most days I find that a relief. You cannot rush an onion. It browns when it browns, and the smell tells you when.
Cook one thing that takes an hour or more. Stay in the kitchen and leave the phone in another room.