Cooking
All the men in my family cook. The mother claims that once upon a time she was the household cook but me and my younger brother are of the firm opinion that the mother is rewriting history in her head. The older brother may have memories of the mother and culinary delights but we haven't really questioned him about this. It is more fun to tell the mother that she is full of mendacity.
Now the old man is one of eight brothers and sisters split evenly four men and women. All of em can cook. Most of em are pretty good at it. (I don't think the doctor is exactly great at it like most of the others but she was busy with education and practicing medicine so I suppose some areas need a little sacrifice.) All the brothers and sisters learned how to cook from their mother and they learned, to a greater or lesser degree, the arts of the butcher from their father.
So there was no growing up in our house without learning to cook. The old man would start dinner and he would make a point of calling one of us into the kitchen and making us do at least one part of the preparation. It was a learn by doing sort of environment. One of the things he taught me that has stuck with me over the years was whenever he was cooking a big meal like a holiday meal or a dish for a social gathering, he would always take out the cook book (He had one of those black white and red checkered ones I think its a Betty crocker book. I'm not sure. As we got older we started buying him new ones for Christmas but he always went back to the old cook book). He could have cooked a dish a hundred times and still he would pull out the cook book and review the cooking instructions and ingredient list.
Now there are a couple of reasons to do this. First of all. We forget things, like ingredients or temperatures and it never hurts to make sure you have everything before you start. The second reason to do this is to get into the mindset that cooking takes patience. You can't hurry things along by turning up the heat. You can't walk away from a frying pan. You read the recipe to slow down.
So anyway now that we have five adults here we spilt up the cooking a bit. If the old man is home he will usually do it. He likes cooking and he is very territorial about his kitchen. Even if he is feeling tired and wants to take a nap he will give instructions and hover over who ever is cooking until we almost need to force him from the room. (Not that we could him being super cop with the guns and the hand cuffs and stuff).
Now I'm not the best cook. I'm a pretty lazy guy so the idea of having to stand in front of a stove for an hour to prepare a meal doesn't sit well with me. I'm a fan of the microwave. Push 2 minutes. Walk away come back. Something is warm enough to eat. Scarf it down. Get back to whatever it was that I was doing.
Now I'm not a bad cook. Yesterday I made fried green tomatoes for the mother and a cousin who stopped by. While I personally dislike them I was told they turned out very well. My bartending experience helps me to think about how flavors work together. I can usually put together a good meal if I must.
Now the little brother is an excellent cook when it comes to anything you can make in a pan and stick in the oven. He's not so good about standing in front of the stove. He wants to pick up a book or watch TV or something while the meal cooks. When he has to, he can pull it together and make a good meal.
Now his wife came from a house where her mother did all the cooking and cleaning. She has little to no experience with food preparation for more than one person. My brother is trying to teach her, but he's not that great a teacher. He has her cooking things on a George foreman sometimes (which is fine for one but when you are cooking for five some of the food is going to get cold). And he has completely missed the lesson on timing everything to finish at the same time.
Now if we weren't all living together and I happened to stop by for a meal and part of it came cold. I'd naturally suck it up and say, "excellent meal" The thing is there is not time frame on them moving. With a kid on the way and with my sister in law working only a couple of days a week there's no way they are going to be able to get a place of their own any time soon. That, of course is not a problem, I just wonder if I'm going to keep from saying something thoughtless at some point. Me and the brother fought constantly growing up. We don't leave things unsaid.
In summary: The old man is a great cook. I like the microwave. I want warm meat.
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Now the old man is one of eight brothers and sisters split evenly four men and women. All of em can cook. Most of em are pretty good at it. (I don't think the doctor is exactly great at it like most of the others but she was busy with education and practicing medicine so I suppose some areas need a little sacrifice.) All the brothers and sisters learned how to cook from their mother and they learned, to a greater or lesser degree, the arts of the butcher from their father.
So there was no growing up in our house without learning to cook. The old man would start dinner and he would make a point of calling one of us into the kitchen and making us do at least one part of the preparation. It was a learn by doing sort of environment. One of the things he taught me that has stuck with me over the years was whenever he was cooking a big meal like a holiday meal or a dish for a social gathering, he would always take out the cook book (He had one of those black white and red checkered ones I think its a Betty crocker book. I'm not sure. As we got older we started buying him new ones for Christmas but he always went back to the old cook book). He could have cooked a dish a hundred times and still he would pull out the cook book and review the cooking instructions and ingredient list.
Now there are a couple of reasons to do this. First of all. We forget things, like ingredients or temperatures and it never hurts to make sure you have everything before you start. The second reason to do this is to get into the mindset that cooking takes patience. You can't hurry things along by turning up the heat. You can't walk away from a frying pan. You read the recipe to slow down.
So anyway now that we have five adults here we spilt up the cooking a bit. If the old man is home he will usually do it. He likes cooking and he is very territorial about his kitchen. Even if he is feeling tired and wants to take a nap he will give instructions and hover over who ever is cooking until we almost need to force him from the room. (Not that we could him being super cop with the guns and the hand cuffs and stuff).
Now I'm not the best cook. I'm a pretty lazy guy so the idea of having to stand in front of a stove for an hour to prepare a meal doesn't sit well with me. I'm a fan of the microwave. Push 2 minutes. Walk away come back. Something is warm enough to eat. Scarf it down. Get back to whatever it was that I was doing.
Now I'm not a bad cook. Yesterday I made fried green tomatoes for the mother and a cousin who stopped by. While I personally dislike them I was told they turned out very well. My bartending experience helps me to think about how flavors work together. I can usually put together a good meal if I must.
Now the little brother is an excellent cook when it comes to anything you can make in a pan and stick in the oven. He's not so good about standing in front of the stove. He wants to pick up a book or watch TV or something while the meal cooks. When he has to, he can pull it together and make a good meal.
Now his wife came from a house where her mother did all the cooking and cleaning. She has little to no experience with food preparation for more than one person. My brother is trying to teach her, but he's not that great a teacher. He has her cooking things on a George foreman sometimes (which is fine for one but when you are cooking for five some of the food is going to get cold). And he has completely missed the lesson on timing everything to finish at the same time.
Now if we weren't all living together and I happened to stop by for a meal and part of it came cold. I'd naturally suck it up and say, "excellent meal" The thing is there is not time frame on them moving. With a kid on the way and with my sister in law working only a couple of days a week there's no way they are going to be able to get a place of their own any time soon. That, of course is not a problem, I just wonder if I'm going to keep from saying something thoughtless at some point. Me and the brother fought constantly growing up. We don't leave things unsaid.
In summary: The old man is a great cook. I like the microwave. I want warm meat.
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posted by Rich Rosenthal II at 2:23 AM
4 Comments:
i hate cooking; i'm lazy too. sometimes even those microwaved meals are too complicated. "cook 3 1/2 minutes, stir the rice, then cook 1 1/2 minutes more? rotate 1/4 turn every minute?" what is that? my favorite is the popcorn button: one press, leave it alone, and three minutes later i have a perfect bag of popcorn!
You need a microwave withe the spinning plate. It eliminates the turn part. Still gotta go in a stir some things or you end up with something that is hot on the edges but has little icey bits in the middle
Rich, thanks for the memory provoking post. My dad cooks, and is not a cop, but he hovers over others in "his" kitchen as well.
I like to cook, and recently I've taken to experimenting with bread. Focaccia, pizza and then white and wheat regular. I bought a bread machine, but I just love to pound on it myself sometimes. It can be therapeutic.
timing is an ungrasped concept for me as well... the veggies are always done before the meat is half cooked but i'm always paranoid the meat will get dried out waiting for other stuff to finish. i'd rather have mushy vegetables than over cooked meat.
both my mom and dad cook. Mom cooks as if she were serving an army....i seem to do the same. this is wastefull since i'm normally just cooking for two and neither of us eat that much....with the exception of steak, we save room for things like candy.
fried green tomatoes are an excellent comfort food.
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