Idiot Cook Struggles

For 2015 I did not come up with any rules or resolutions or anything like that, but I have been using the new year as a time to start fresh with cooking more at home and less eating out. Since my family has also started our weight loss competition again, I’m trying to pair that with more low calorie recipes. It helps that I found the best website ever. Everything I’ve made so far has been delicious, and I already lost a bunch of the extra weight and slight pudge put on over the holidays.

I promise this is not a post where I’m going to crow about how skinny and fabulous I am while you’re not. Actually, this is a post where I’m going to share some of my secret life struggles that will probably make you feel better about yourself as a person.

I’m nice like that.

Here’s the conflict in this happy little story: I am not good at cooking. I do not like cooking. I never really properly learned the basics of cooking.

My mother is an amazing cook. My brother is an amazing cook. A cook to me is someone who can throw random ass ingredients together and wind up with something tasty. In order to cook almost anything I need a recipe to follow, and even then I wind up with difficulties.

Now all my attempts this year have turned out pretty well, but it’s been quite a challenge. So in an effort to prove that ANYBODY can cook (with a recipe, don’t even talk to me about culinary geniuses like my friend Jenn that whip up random food at the drop of a hat. They’re ruining the curve), I decided to list some of my issues the past two week that normal cooks take for granted. Let’s call them the Idiot Cook Struggles.

Idiot Cook Struggle #1 – Where the hell do I find that??

I was immensely proud of myself because instead of wandering the grocery store and grabbing what looked good (and probably fattening), I made an exact list of what was needed for each recipe and then planned the time to go shopping. I felt empowered, I felt invigorated.

Then I got to the store.

At least half of the ingredients I needed I have never purchased before in my life. I spent at least 20 minutes lost in the produce department, trying to find things like chives and debating whether the red pepper was supposed to be in that weird shape, or if that meant it was bad.

It didn’t get any better when I left produce. I walked up and down aisle after aisle with no understanding of where one would find breadcrumbs (I felt like it should be with the bread. It was not). I am morally opposed to asking people for help, so despite the fact that I walked into the store knowing exactly what I was going to buy, it took me almost 2 hours. 2 HOURS

Idiot Cook Struggle #2 – What’s in a name?

I wrote down EXACTLY what the recipes said for each ingredient, thinking that would make it easier.

Wrong again.

Apparently many items of food go by multiple names. And one is just supposed to know that. Eventually I started making assumptions. Most likely “baby bellas” are the same as “sliced baby portabella mushrooms.” That seems logical. Whether or not skim milk and fat free milk were the same thing did throw me for a temporary loop. And let’s not even talk about things like chickpeas which can randomly be called garbanzo beans on various cans.

This happens with the proportions of a recipe too. For the life of me I couldn’t figure out whether a “stalk of celery” meant an actual stalk, or the whole thing of celery. Google wasn’t helpful either as I found examples leaning both ways, and the overall decision was “use your judgment of what makes sense for the recipe.”

Damnit people, if I knew what made sense I wouldn’t be following a recipe!

Idiot Cook Struggle #3 – Chop, Chop

One of the main reasons I hate cooking is that I royally suck at chopping things. I refuse to chop when anyone is watching because you can literally hear the intake of breath as they become convinced I’m about to lose one of my fingers.

Which I still have all 10, thank you very much.

I find chopping instructions to be nonsensical. What is this “diced” versus “minced” you speak of, and how do I accomplish that? When you say “small slice” what is that small in comparison to? If the recipe calls for “cubes” are somewhat rectangular shapes okay?

Then to my astonishment, as I was looking through the knife section (all my knives are dull, and I’m not even sure how one goes about sharpening them or if I have the necessary tools for that) I saw a set that marked one knife for veggies, one for fruit, and one for tomatoes. Are you really supposed to be using different knives for different types of chopping?? I have one knife I use to chop, some paring knives I use if it’s dirty, a bread knife, and some big cleaver-ish type knife I generally ignore but my friend Jenn has used. Actually I think I have a few other knives but I ignore them too as I don’t understand their purpose.

So it’s possible I’m doing it even more wrong than I thought.

But despite these struggles I impressed myself this weekend with some AMAZING chicken pot pie soup, and broccoli mac & cheese. Last weekend I was pretty happy with petite turkey meatloaf and a loaded cauliflower mash thingy. Next weekend? Who knows.

What’s the moral of the story? Any idiot can (kinda) learn to cook (things based on a recipe) and have it turn out pretty good (but probably totally different from when a real chef makes it, and that’s okay).