Cooking

As much as I like to think of myself as a modern liberated woman, I still sometimes worry about my lack of cooking ability. Because it's not just that I'm not a great cook, that I can't make up my own recipes or sometimes my cakes fall or my sauces are too tart...I wish I had those problems (although I have no problem BEING a saucy tart)...my problem is more that I can't make toast.

A lie. I can make toast. Or, rather, I could if I owned a toaster. Toast and spaghetti, and bacon and funky tasting eggs...so breakfast is covered. Well, if you like spaghetti for breakfast. I also have the recipe for my stepdads awesome bbq sauce which I made once and it was pretty good although it requires 2398219 ingredients.

Everyone in my family cooks. My mom is a great cook and well known for her deviled eggs, meat loaf, homemade spaghetti sauce, stuffing from heaven and that chocolate thing at Thanksgiving. My stepdad makes a mean chili, jumbalaya, patizzah (look it up, I spelled it wrong though) and cheeseburgers stuffed with deliciousness. My brother is a chef. Literally, he went to culinary school and is now a chef. My sister Morgan likes to experiment and make things that are weird like fish tacos and peanut butter tofu surprise, but she still really enjoys it. I neither enjoy it nor am capable. To me, why waste all that time assembling the food when you could just go buy it? I know, cooking is cheaper and healthier...but...also harder. And I hate things that are harder.

Cooking requires having things like "pots" and also things like "pans". For the last two years I've had A bowl and A plate. (Thanks to Ikea, I finally have more). If you went to my house right now and surveyed the kitchen here is what you would find:

-Book shelf full of tchotchkys and cookbooks I don't use and photo albums.
-Refridgerator: Inside the freezer you would find ice. And a REALLY old bag of frozen asparagus. In the fridge you would find a Britta, some mustard and a bag of rotten sugar snap peas.
-A litter box.
-A counter with an empty pizza box on it.
- A trash can.
- A sink with a bowl and a glass in it.
- A teeny little oven.
- A cabinet where I keep things like napkins, peanut butter, vitamins, candles, oatmeal
- A cabinet where I keep dishes
-A microwave that magically makes my food for me.
-A hangy thing that is meant for bananas but I keep tea in it.
- A cabinet where I keep pots and pans and cookie sheets (I've never made cookies)
- A cabinet where I keep Christmas decorations and cat food.
-My bed

The bed is actually in the dining room part of my kitchen, but it's still kinda weird. But I like it. So, not really conducive to cooking. Thankfully. Cause I hate cooking.

However, with Thanksgiving on the Horizon I suddenly had this image of myself in the future, married and carrying the juicy delicious turkey into the dining room for my husband and my three little children (A girl that looks like me, a boy that looks like him, and our beloved Asian adoptee.) I'm wearing a white apron with cherries on it and red lipstick.
I have a poofy dress and my hair all done up and as I carry the gleaming turkey into the room my little family applauds and my little son who looks like his father but will totally grow up to be gay and we will be really accepting of that says, "Oh Mumsie, that looks even better than last years!" and my little daughter who looks like me only way cuter, which I will exploit by forcing her to be in pageants and talent competitions and shouting "SMILE BIGGER YOU SPOILED BRAT!" will look at me and say, "Oh! Please teach me how to make such a perfect turkey!" and my little adopted Asian daughter will just sort of clap and say "How lucky I was to end up with a perfect turkey making mum like you!" And then my deeply attractive husband will say, "I am most grateful this thanksgiving, as I am every year, for my cooking genius wife who is also talented, funny, gorgeous like a model and thin as a rail." And then...and then...whoa...sorry.

So to make this disgusting retro dream a reality I called my mom today and asked if she would take me step by step this year through the process of making the turkey. She was super excited and informed me that it is very easy. I love moms turkey, we always buy kosher since Yaakov is always with us on T-Giv and I'm telling you, it just tastes better.

Moms lesson begins over the phone. First you have to defrost the turkey, you can do this by putting it in the fridge a couple days before.

That is not a problem.

When you are ready to cook, you unwrap the turkey and put it in a pot.

Ok, I will need to get a really big pot, but this is still manageable.

Then, you fucking REACH INSIDE THE TURKEY HOLE AND PULL OUT THE BAG OF INNARDS.

...

...

What? What? The BAG of...WHAT?

I stop my mom mid sentence.

"The bag of innards, Sweetie, the stuff from inside the bird."

I re-experience a bit of my lunch. "What the hell are you talking about? Why is that in there?"

"Well, Hon, it's the inside of the bird..."

"But why would you want that? Do you eat it?"

"Honey, you cook with it..."


I tell mom that I will not only NOT be helping to make the turkey, but that I would really appreciate if the turkey could continue to just magically appear on my plate without me ever having to know anything about a bag of anything that was ever inside of it.

Suddenly I have a vision of my little gay soon and my little wide eyed daughter crying for turkey on Thanksgiving while their adopted little sister chows down on a holiday hot pocket. Maybe future husband will be in charge of the bird. Maybe future husband will be in charge of all the cooking (and cleaning, and bills, and driving) and I will be in charge of the laundry. I'm down with laundry. Kinda.

So I say to mom, "Well, I would like to cook something at my house and bring it. It just can't require spices...or dishes...or ovens."

Long story short...I'm in charge of bringing the olives and nuts.