I hate cooking. Mainly, because I suck at it. It’s one of the key talking points of my daily internal monologue of self loathing, because now that I’m a wife, and about to be a mother (and you know, live in the world where I’m expected to be social and participate when people have parties, and also I was raised to know that the polite thing to do is offer to bring something when someone invites you to their house for dinner) I feel like I’ve really dropped the ball on finding my way around the kitchen. And I have no excuse. Our wedding guests were very generous, and honestly, it’s like a Williams Sonoma catalogue vomited Cuisenart, and Calphalon, and Le Cruset all over my tiny kitchen – so it’s not for lack of tools, or anything like that.
Scott can cook his ass off. I think that might be part of the problem. I have a husband who is very generous with his time and energy and usually doesn’t complain too much about cooking dinner, but I know that deep down somewhere he’s got to be thinking “Jeez, how’d I get such a dud wife? This bitch can’t cook a lick…and she’s not great at cleaning, either…or pretty much pitching in in any way, except to grow me a baby and complain for nine months straight…” (But we all know you married me for my fine ass, and my fine ass alone, right babe? What’s that? My ass has devolved into giant pregnant mush? Oh.) Anyway…
So yesterday, (after a very long Thursday that ended with us coming home late to an empty refrigerator and nothing for dinner besides Trader Joe’s pizza and half a jar of pasta sauce) I decided that I was going to *try* to give the guy a break and have dinner ready for him. I went to the market – I bought some cooking type things and I came home, all proud of myself, that we were going to have a relaxing evening wherein he could chill on the couch and I would cook for him. I would even make dessert. So I get out all of my tools, and start to bring out the ingredients, and I realize…I have completely forgotten to buy the meat, which is the center of the dish I am attempting to make. And now it’s kind of late, and I’m a lazy a-hole, and there’s no way in hell I’m going back to the market to get it. I mean, I could, I consider it….but NO. Scott suggests I make it without the meat, and just cook up some rice to fill in the blanks (the blanks being our stomachs) and since that seems like a better idea than going back to the market (which as I mentioned, I’m already against) I concede. We will have the beautiful chicken dish I had planned, sans chicken.
And then the real fun starts. And this is what is at the root of my cooking issues. I’m just too impatient to cook. I can’t read instructions. I can’t be bothered with prep. I tend to just fire up the burners, and GO! And that usually doesn’t end well with meals that have more than one component. Last night, I even took the time to chop the onions and vegetables first…or so I thought…only to discover that as the onions were sticking to the bottom of the cast iron pan I should never have attempted to use (with all that stainless steel and cast iron we have lining our cupboards, my cooking usually only employs our single non-stick pan) I hadn’t prepped the asparagus, and things were burning, and my eyes were tearing up, and I had to call in reinforcements to wash the rest of the vegetables so I could get them into the pan as quickly as possible to avoid totally destroying the pathetic half-meal we would end up with.
In the end, it wasn’t disgusting. It was edible. I even had seconds. Through my apologies for being so lame, Scott continued to insist he liked it… But I was reminded of yet another thing I’m going to need to improve on before I try to feed my child anything that’s not coming out of my boobs, because how embarrassed will she be when she invites a friend over for dinner and they see her frazzled sweaty Mom running around the kitchen shrieking for help and end up with some concoction of sides on their plate because good ‘ol Mom forgot to buy the meat? Oh…and then I threw up. (I actually think it was unrelated to the cooking debacle…I am pregnant after all…but it was a kind of hilarious end to a disastrous meal attempt, if I do say so myself. …Although I wasn’t laughing at the time.)
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**Disclaimer: I’m not completely useless. I’m good with a crock pot, I make a mean bowl of Chili, and I actually CAN bake. So until further notice – all you gourmet friends of mine – I’m going to continue to offer to bring dessert to your dinner parties.**
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