When I was single, you could find three things in my fridge: Weight Watchers pizzas, Diet Coke and grapes. Oh, and some milk for my tea. My microwave was my best friend and my oven was for storage. This may sound boring to some, but to me eating a pizza every night was just fine. But I have accepted that this doesn’t quite work with kids, let alone a husband.
Now, I could blame my lack of culinary skills on my mother, as predictable as that might be. But truth be told, although she was often accused of making “sawdust chicken” and “hockey puck hamburgers,” she still makes a mean spaghetti sauce, albeit based on a few different types of Ragu. But she did cook for us every night and it never seemed to stress her out.
I, on the other hand, am a basket case in the kitchen. First off, I really hate dealing with raw meat. It just feels wiggly, icky, gross and any other word you might have heard your five-year-old use to describe why he wouldn’t eat their dinner last night. Plus, I have no innate confidence as a cook. I am going to tell you this right now: I do not know what it means to sear meat. I am not quite sure how to boil an egg. I can only make pancakes by making one big one in the oven. Recently, I thought I could use my whisk to make yogurt turn into fluffy ice cream (I missed the part of the recipe that said that you put it in the freezer to solidify it.) I also didn’t know how to use a manual can opener until about three years ago. And sometimes I still struggle with it a bit. OK, I struggle with it a lot.
This is all not to say that I am not trying to learn. Inspired by my friend Emma’s awesome blog (http://emmapeel.typepad.com/emmas_mumblings/ ), I have tried to plan meals out the week before, have tried to make interesting things with healthy ingredients. But I have yet to find a recipe that pleases everyone in the house. Annie even turns her head at green bean casserole (or “beans with crunchies” as we call it). My husband tends to be the only one to love the Jessica Seinfeld recipes. The kids like roast beef and vegetables, but Dan finds that bland. Baby Jay rejects purees that I make him but loves jarred food. And frankly I’d be happy with a bowl of rice with soy sauce.
I tell you all this because it is Wednesday and I am out of food for dinner tonight. I have enough left-overs to squeak out a dinner for the kids, but I have no idea what Dan and I will eat. On Sunday, the week was all planned out. Yesterday I was going to make my friend Heather’s BBQ pork recipe in my crock pot and we’d have leftovers tonight. Thursday was going to be a meatloaf recipe from a free pamphlet from Safeway. But then my BBQ pork kind of got delayed. Why? In addition to receiving a fantastic curry from my babysitter, I was also at a bit of a stand-still in Heather’s recipe. My problem: my pork loin was so long that it wouldn’t fit into the crock pot.
So, why, you ask , why did you not just cut the pork in half? I have no idea. Because Heather didn’t mention this in her recipe? Because I started to wonder why pork was so long? Anyways, I just stared at it every day, thought about cutting it and then did what I always do. I put it back in the freezer.
Frankly, I don’t know why I feel the pressure to be a great cook . I work all day, take care of the kids, and I do feed them, which is more than I can say for the plants withering all about my house. And, in case you are wondering, I have never given my kids a Weight Watchers pizza.
I think the problem is that as a STORK, your proximity to the kitchen during work hours somehow makes you feel like you must be June Cleaver between conference calls. And frankly DORKS (what I lovingly call the husbands of STORKS) do expect a meal at night. They may not admit it, not even to themselves, but, just like they expect you to get their dry cleaning during the day, a little part of them is not 100 percent sure that you really work as hard as they do all day. I mean, on an intellectual level they know it. But when they come home in a suit and you’re in old sweats and then the kids mention that you took them to the park, well , you can just imagine what they are thinking. And it isn’t that your trip to the park was the equivalent to their lunch out with their co-workers. My co-workers just happen to be five and under.
Now, before you DORKs get all hot and bothered about this, I want to be clear that, as I am sure you have all heard before, it’s not you, it’s me. I somehow have this idea that to be the best mother in the world I need to be hitting on all cylinders at all times, doing crafts, doing laundry, and making meals. I almost feel like I have to hide from my kids that fact that I am also getting work done.
The funny thing is that the other day Danny had a friend over to play. His friend was about to come into my office to ask me something when Danny stopped him. “You can’t go in there right now,” Danny said. “Mommy is working. And I think she is on a conference call.” And you know what the crazy thing is, he said that with the same pride he takes when describing his art work or bike riding skills.
So I think everyone is OK with things they way they are. In fact, I think maybe the only person who cares I can’t cook around here is me.
Dan, get ready to order up some take-out tonight and to make a huge batch of sauce to last us all next week come Sunday. I am going to concentrate on other ways to improve my motherhood. Like my Lenten sacrifice this year: not talking negatively about anyone at all in any circumstance. I have to admit that I chose this because I just couldn’t bear to give up my beloved candy this year.
Being positive all the time, frankly, has got to be easier than chicken mirabella. And maybe even better for my kids’ souls. But I have some ground turkey defrosting just in case. I’ll let you know how it goes.