in issue nine: humor
Scintillations
Hair Dye Hell
Morning Glory
Made With Extra Love
My
Father's Legacy
It's A Gift
Toe Job
Need
A Laugh?
Cleaning Day
Letters to
My
Younger Self
Moody Girl
photography
Beach
Foot
Leaf
Gnome
Picnic
Tables
Flower Circus
Yellow
Bikes
poetry
Jellyfish
artwork
Cover: El
Grillo
Falling In Love
workshops
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Issue Ten:
Free Write
Issue Eleven: Play
After our first
date my husband walked me to my front door, and we stood there
awkwardly making small talk before I finally invited him in.
While Jeff perched uncomfortably on the futon that served as a
sofa and a bed in my tiny studio apartment, I called to him
from the kitchen, "Can I get you something to
drink?" and cursed when he said yes. I stared into the
fridge--three apples, a carton of milk I was certain had gone
sour, and stale bread stared back at me. "How about some
tea?" I called back to him, silently praying that I had
at least one teabag in my cupboards. Thankfully, he loved tea
and even better, he took it black, so I didn’t have to
explain the sour milk situation. We sat together sipping our
tea, alternately talking and saying nothing. Over the next
several hours we drank six cups of tea, which I managed to
make from the only two teabags I had in the house, and Jeff
left shortly before 5am, without ever learning the meager
contents of my fridge.
Several more dates and several cups of tea later, I let Jeff in on my dirty little secret. I was surviving on fruit, granola bars and take-out. I could not cook. At all. He stared at me in mock disbelief before bursting into laughter. He finally understood, he told me, why I’d never offered him anything other than tea. On our next date Jeff arrived at the door with several bags overflowing with groceries and told me that dinner tonight would be at home. Using the only pot in my cupboard, a hand-me-down frying pan and knives that were almost too dull to cut butter, Jeff produced a fantastic supper: crisp green salad, warm garlic bread and shrimp pasta with cream sauce that I still beg him to make today.
Jeff’s adeptness in the kitchen made me want to try cooking. I called my grandmother and asked her for my favorite banana bread recipe. A trip to the grocery store and a few new baking dishes later, I stood in the kitchen prepared to tackle my first baking project. I measured and mixed ingredients, poured the creamy batter into a loaf pan and slipped it into my perfectly preheated oven. Forty-five minutes later I smelled the banana bread baking in the kitchen and congratulated myself on my accomplishment.
Twenty minutes and three magazine articles later, I realized the smell coming from the kitchen was no longer of warm bananas, but burnt bread. I’d lost all track of time reading the latest issue of Cosmo and I’d forgotten about my banana bread. It had turned into a charred, rock-hard mass of black, stuck hopelessly to the sides of the metal loaf pan.
Supportive of my effort to learn my way around the kitchen, Jeff showed up for our next date with a timer and a lot of encouragement to continue. And I did. Over the course of several months I baked a few loaves of delicious banana bread, made an apple crisp that I’m still telling people about, and stocked my kitchen with "real" food for the first time in my life.
After a few months of success in the kitchen, I had gained enough confidence to try more complicated recipes. I had been raving about double-chocolate-chocolate-chip cupcakes a friend baked, and decided it was time for me to try replicating the tasty morsels at home. I read over the recipe several times, determined to avoid any mistakes that might result in less-than-perfect cupcakes. With all of the ingredients laid out on the kitchen counter, I began to carefully blend the ingredients exactly as the recipe instructed.
Twenty minutes later a batch of perfectly baked cupcakes emerged from my oven. I stared at the 12 oversized cupcakes with a pride normally reserved for children on their first day of kindergarten. I could barely contain my excitement over my culinary success, and when Jeff walked in the door that night, I practically shoved a cupcake into his mouth.
“Sweetie, these are delicious,” he said, his mouth still full with cupcake. “I know,” I told him, beaming, “I’m really proud of how well they turned out. But they were so messy to make. They had to be mixed by hand and I hated all of the flour and chocolate and eggs getting under my fingernails and all over my hands.”
Jeff stared at me in disbelief before bursting into laughter. He laughed until tears fell from the corners of his eyes and no sound came from his mouth. This went on for what seemed like an eternity before he finally told me that "mixing by hand" meant you weren’t supposed to use an electric mixer, not that you were literally supposed to plunge your hands into the bowl. Jeff could tell by the look on my face that I felt like a complete idiot. Before I could say anything, he looked at me and sweetly said, "These cupcakes are the most delicious creations I’ve ever tasted, and the fact that you kneaded the ingredients together with your hands just means they were made with extra love." I fell in love with him at that very moment.
Now that we’re married, Jeff has graciously taken on the responsibility of cooking for both of us. Instead of take-out, we feast on lasagna, burritos, perfectly cooked steaks and my favorite shrimp pasta. I’m still learning, but more importantly, I’m still trying.
I’ve burned several more loaves of banana bread and countless batches of cookies over the past three years. I’ve attempted to steam rice but forgot to add water, I’ve tried making homemade pizza dough that simply wouldn’t rise and I've come close to giving Jeff salmonella poisoning from undercooked chicken. Despite these mishaps, I’m still cooking. I’ve perfected my mom’s apple crisp, baked homemade mini-cheesecakes for thirty at last year’s Christmas party and even recreated Jeff’s famous shrimp pasta. And I regularly make my double-chocolate-chocolate-chip cupcakes, plunging my hands into the messy dough with a childlike glee and smiling to myself because I know they’re being made with extra love.
Double Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cupcakes
1
pkg (4 ½ oz) chocolate instant pudding mix
1 Devil’s food cake mix
1 pkg (12oz) chocolate chips
1 ¾ cup milk
2 eggs
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and mix by hand for 2 minutes. Place cupcake liners in muffin pans and pour to ¾ full. Bake for 20-25 minutes
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