Love and My Fear of Cooking

My people show how much they love you by serving massive amounts of food. Then, if you don’t eat several portions, they feel that you don’t love them back. It’s a common disorder and painfully difficult to navigate. Let’s say I invite family from far away. If we’re not going to a restaurant and the kitchen is available, they will make themselves at home and prepare some delicious comfort food. Gigantic vats of the stuff. During the meal they’ll keep checking my eyes to make sure I love their creation. If I try and act cool, they will ask, “Do you like it?”

“Of course, of course. It’s delicious,” I answer, knowing how hard it is to make a great dinner. Plus, they came from far away and deep inside, I know, I should have cooked. Of course, I thankfully slurp up every morsel of the meal, mainly because I’m pretty easy to please, but subconsciously, I’m looking for a good reason to overeat. How can I argue with home-cooked and mouthwatering? Forgetting my doctor’s warnings about portion control, I inhale every fattening, delicious calorie. I take seconds to prove my love.

The reason I didn’t cook is, I’m not sure they’d like it. I guess it’s called experience. Everyone has varied tastes these days. Honey and nut allergies, milk sensitivities, etc. Few things can be as unsettling as rumors about how your fancy dinner caused a family member to go into anaphylactic shock. Ever since, I have cooking trepidation—there’s really a phobia—Mageirocophobia. (The fear of cooking). Fortunately, it’s not a severe case and I don’t need treatment. When it comes to love, I’m not a quitter.

The younger relations wash sugar-free and fat-free down with copious amounts of craft beer. Moments later, they begin a lecture about a new workout, while smoking. The older ones prefer bland over spicy. Teenage girls are in a vegan phase, which is a good thing but this usually lasts until they taste a brew-house burger. The boys like barbecue, but they haven’t yet studied carcinogens in school.

There's also the internet educational system. It’s enough to make you choke. Suddenly, everyone is a chef. Do I used grass-fed meat and range-free chickens? No, I use what looks  best at the supermarket and just like grandma, I rinse everything. Still, the dinner conversation can turn ugly. I must be out of touch or cruel if I don’t watch those movie documentaries about the truth behind our food. Don’t I know about the unethical treatment of animals? The crowded chicken coops? The thrashed wheat? 

Salad ingredients seem to be controversial too. Especially the dressing. Too sweet—too cheesy—too oily—too tart. Some don't like arugula, others hate cilantro. There's a romaine lettuce recall. Have I heard about it? Yup, I'm not serving it, am I? Help. And why do people pick fruit out of their salad?  I’m back to casseroles. They seem safe enough and contain a fair amount of vegetables.

PicJumbo picture by Viktor Hanacek

And don’t get me started talking about dessert. Let’s say, I spent hours baking, frosting and decorating something amazing.But instead of appreciation, tell me why I'm being quizzed about ingredients? Did I use flour? Did I use sugar? If I pull something ready made from the freezer, “does it have artificial ingredients? Food coloring?” They look at me as if I want to poison their children. “Yes, it has sugar. It’s called dessert.”

But sadly, I’m back at that casserole. I still worry when placing the big dish in the center of the table. After all, I put my heart into it.

Speaking of hearts, it's aflutter. I search their eyes while perspiration breaks from my temples. If they don’t immediately look impressed, I’m all worried they won’t like it. If they don’t take seconds, my day might be ruined. Scooping almost full plates of food into the garbage pail, makes me want to cry.

You see, it’s a vicious cycle, fighting a nation of fast food.  But a cycle of love. Someday, as my family DNA dissipates into the ether, there will be other, worse issues than this one. I imagine my future descendants screaming at each other about carbs, gluten and the Keto diet, which is also called the Caveman diet. The cycle has progressed to the point that the Stone Age has returned. Clubs have been replaced with modern weapons and hunting for the exact taste, the perfect morsel of food to satiate immediate desire, is only one freeway ramp away. And love.....Humans will have to find new ways to express their feelings. 

As for my house, there’s this persistent issue connecting food with love. The slow cooker is simmering and the aroma is floating throughout the house. My husband is a great cook and whether I like his masterful concoction or not, I’ll be taking seconds.

Good excuse, huh?

The Supreme Web

Have you ever noticed those strange moments when you’re wondering about something and a very obvious but deconstructed answer is right in front of your face? Perhaps you’re wondering whether you should go to the party but exactly at that moment when you're thinking about what to wear or who to bring, you come to a STOP sign. Directly above the word STOP someone has carved the word NO into the sign. Would you take that as a ‘no’ don’t go to the party, or simply a coincidence?

I remember feeling anxious about a certain meeting at work and while driving my car the song ‘Take it Easy’ by the Eagles came on the radio. When I stepped into the lobby at work, the same song was playing on a completely different station. Do you think someone wanted me to take it easy? It’s kind of like a favorite cartoon where a guy is asking God for a sign and a giant neon sign falls from the sky landing in front of him. The sign says, ‘A sign”.

Then there’s the dessert menu. Try it sometime. Listen to the background music playing in the restaurant before you commit to another thousand calories. If they’re playing Queen’s, "Fat-Bottomed Girls" you might want to reconsider but if they’re playing Billy Joel’s, “Just the Way You Are,” you might as well go for it! The smart restaurateur where I ordered dessert last had ‘You Are So Beautiful" playing on the radio, so of course I indulged.

A few rows like this....

Right now, I’m wondering about a stranger’s crocheted sweater. I know how to crochet and have taken the time to learn many unusual crochet stitches but this sweater wasn’t a typical machine made crocheted sweater that you could buy and it also looked extremely difficult to make. The woman wearing the lacy cardigan could have made it or received it as a gift. This large woman, with row after row of complex stitches, sat in front of me last Sunday at church giving me an hour to ponder more than the sermon.(Which interestingly was about the multitudes sharing the five loaves and two fish.) 

The complicated stitch pattern repeated sometimes but only after approximately twenty unique rows. Her white sweater seemed to represent something to me, maybe because my insides have been feeling twisted into a tight crocheted pattern. Lately, there have been some unusual things happening in my life and if you know about my past, then you know I’m supposed to be the strong, cool-headed voice of reason. Giant knots are obstructing my goals and draining the oxygen from my heart. Give it to God everyone says. Will prayer help things unravel—in a good way? Will He help me get everything untangled and readjusted for some semblance of normalcy? I’m quite clear on the concept that the future looks difficult. It’s a rocky terrain and I’m heading uphill. Still wondering why I needed this reminder.

and some rows like this....

Am I one cloud formation away from the cuckoos’ nest 

or simply reading too much into things? Has this happened to you?

What do you think? Do you allow the universe to speak to you?

T is for Tako

You get off the plane and immediately feel like eating some tacos. Right? Okay, but be careful because the word taco in Hawaiian is spelled Tako and is actually the word for octopus. Seriously. So, unless you love calamari, you might want to wait with the Mexican food.

You can thank me by reading Penniless Hearts or if you've already read it, then maybe you can tell one of your friends about how much fun you had reading it! Reading Penniless Hearts is like a first class trip to Hawaii without squiggly surprises on the menu.

Will You Make a Difference?

Another Never Give Up Post!

(I can't believe how embarrassing this is because it reflects on the fact that I'm, well...not a spring chicken...or as young people might say, 'old'. Adding insult to my own injuries, it is also apparent that I'm not much of a graphic artist, because I wanted to make notations on this old newspaper page but can't figure out how to size it for my blog. The notations point out the date, my picture and a picture of the restaurant owner. The writing circled in red is similar to what I have written under the photo.)

Imagine my surprise when I walked into a restaurant recently and tasted something distinct and familiar. The intoxicating scent of garlic and Italian food transported me back to my days as a newspaper restaurant columnist for a local paper near the beach. Even more surprising was the name on the back of the menu--could it be the same owner I met in 1987? Yes, you read that right. 1987.That's a long time for the wheels of fortune to return a favor. Here's a portion of my column and the picture of the young man who opened his restaurant with his cousin. When I spoke with him last week he told me he remembered my newspaper and even remembered the article I wrote about his restaurant! How cool is that? Though his secret is obviously delicious food and great service, in some small way my feeling is I had helped with his long-term success. Heck, here he is 30 years later in a brand new restaurant, over 100 miles from the first one, serving his grandmother's recipes as if time stood still. Perhaps I was the lucky one for seeing his success. Back in 1987, writing my column paid for a small studio apartment,(and to tell you the truth, that's probably all I cared about at the time) but meeting this gentleman while enjoying pesto drenched pasta was, and is, even more rewarding.

Where will you be thirty years from now? Will someone remember your work?
 Put your heart into it and the magic will happen!