On Becoming a Cook - Again

For years I've joked that I don't cook. I confess that I try to always marry men who cook. I have a thousand cute sayings I throw in to divert the listener from the fact that I'm a woman who can't cook.

["Given the number of hours in the day, I'd rather spend them sewing/knitting/making music." - "I'd rather slave over a hot computer/sewing machine/kiln than a hot stove." - and so on.]

Well, I got me a great man a year ago. But he doesn't cook! He likes to bake, but cooking is not his thing. So given that it's not "the thing" for either of us, I figured I'd better step up to the plate.

The Jazzman vacuums. He washes dishes. (Sometimes he insists on washing dishes!) He knows how to run the clothes washer, the dryer, and how to fold clothes and deliver them to the top of the stairs. He doesn't cook? So what?! (BTW, he also paints walls and caulks around drafty windows and fixes broken garage door openers! Maybe I'll start referring to him as Superman!!)

I used to cook. When I was first married, at age 21, I had cooked one meal in my life up to that day. I had a set of cookbooks, "The Woman's Day Encyclopedia of Cookery." I would select one volume of the set per week, select five menus, write down all the ingredients and go to the store.

That's how I cook: I follow the recipe to the last dot over the i. If I'm missing one ingredient, be it celery seed or oat germ, I'm sure the meal will be a total and complete failure. Look in the fridge and throw a meal together? That just ain't happenin' in my house!

As you can imagine, this method of cooking lends itself to placing great stress on the cook. So rather than dealing with the stress, over the years I have cooked less and less. I have one or two "go to" recipes that I haul out if I need to host a dinner, but for the most part, my cooking ended when I stopped at the time of my first divorce.

Now here's the rub. When the Jazzman moved into my sphere, he brought a passel of good friends along. (Insert mental image of me shaking my head and wiping tears of gratitude from my eyes over the inordinate generosity of spirit and welcoming nature these friends, en masse, have shown to me since meeting me!) These friends love to socialize. We go out to dinner. We go to each other's homes. We host and attend dinners. We host and attend parties.

Here's the deal: You can't keep taking without giving back.

Merge those two tangents, if you will: I've got a man under my roof and we both need to eat. and We need to host friends for meals in our home if we're ever to be invited back to their homes again.

The result of that merger is that I'm learning to cook again. And, shock of all shocks, rather enjoying it.

Besides having a few more for-company recipes, I just have to cook a couple of meals a week, and the leftovers carry us through to the next weekend. Today it's Sweet and Tangy Slow Cooker Bar-B-Q Pork. I went down and snuck a forkful a few minutes ago and, Yum!, that is one good dish!

The moral of this story? You can teach an old Southern belle new tricks!