The Joy of Cooking

My mother has, for the past 30 years, owned and operated a one-woman catering company, out of which she makes birthday and wedding cakes, small luncheons to feed 20, elaborate dinners to feed 100, tiny desserts for baby showers, meat and veggie trays for football parties, buffets for grand openings of local businesses, brunch for the Chamber, and once, single-handedly prepared and delivered the food for Amazon.com's company Christmas party.

My mother knows how to entertain.

But there is a very big difference between feeding your family and feeding a group of people. I don't struggle much to cook for my husband and child. I can turn raw things into cooked things, I can properly balance a meal and I can make it all come out on time. But the reason I can do that is because it's just my family. It's simply a way to sustain their lives, which I'm in favor of. But I never work off recipes. I simply throw meats and veggies in pans and sprinkle what have you on top and hope for the best.

Pizza is always just a phone call away.

But when cooking for guests or a group or a crowd, there's so much more to consider. No one understands this better than my mother. Presentation. Color. Textures. Keeping things warm (or cold) without drying out. Making things in quantities that feed a group but still keep their integrity. Choosing foods that are rich in flavor but appeal to the masses. Not to mention making sure you do enough in advance so your guests aren't watching you labor. My mother can, with extreme precision, know how much food or how many drinks to buy based on the number of guests who have been invited ("I don't care who you are," she says, "only 60% of the people you invite will show up"). She can tell which time-savers are a waste (pre-cut fruit, shredded cheese) and which are worth it (canned pumpkin, pre-made pie crusts).

Naturally, people assume my mother's profession as a caterer meant that our family grew up on the greatest of foods morning, noon and night. And they are correct. My mother whipped up all kinds of savory dishes every night of the week during my childhood. However, it must be told that, although mother can cook an amazing breakfast, she rarely does. In fact, if my mother's love was most noticeably translated through food, then it should be understood that my siblings and I didn't feel her love until after 10 am every day. So much so that my mother taught me, at the ripe age of three, how to make my own breakfast. Each night, she would place a small glass of milk on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. She would leave a spoon, bowl and a box of cereal on the table. She taught me how to pour the cereal to just the right level in the bowl, and then how to carefully extract the milk glass from the fridge and tip it ever so slightly onto the flakes and carefully walk my bowl over to the living room floor, where she had the remote at the ready for me to just hit "power." She had made sure it was on the cartoon channel the night before. I was to do this, without making noise, until she awoke.

But she more than made up for it at lunch time. And I went to bed each night feeling full and loved.

A month ago a good friend of mine, who is pregnant, invited me to lunch. She smiled coyly from her chair and then slid an envelope across the table. She explained that inside the card was the gender of her child. She and her husband had not looked, so, with the exception of the ultrasound technician, I was to be the only person who knew the gender of the baby. She asked if I would be willing to plan a gender reveal for her and her husband and their families. Feeling beyond honored to have such a massive amount of trust placed on me, I agreed immediately, saying I would happily host at our home and planned to serve brunch.

I left my glowing friend, walked to my car and immediately called my mother. Panicked.


Me: Mom, I need to make brunch for 20 people. I said I would do it, but can you just make something and bring it up? I'll pay you well.

Mom: Of course! I can make tiny egg soufflés, home made biscuits, sausage gravy, fresh fruit, and coffee. I just bought the most beautiful carafe. It will be perfect for the occasion.

Me: Great! Thanks. It's for the weekend after next.

Mom: Oh. Can't do that. Have to cater an anniversary party that day. I'll just email you a recipe. You'll be fine.

And so, later that day, I get an email from my mother with a full page text recipe for an egg casserole that calls for 36 ingredients. One of which was dry mustard.

I call her immediately. Panicked.

Me: What the hell is dry mustard?

Mom: Oh Meg, it's a spice.

Me: Ok. And Worcestershire sauce? Can I just use ketchup?

Mom: Absolutely not. Go buy some. You should always have some in your home.

Me: And it's calling for sausage. I just buy that raw like hamburger meat and brown it, yes?

Mom: You're kidding, right?

So off I go to the store to buy 36 items for a casserole, none of which I currently had in the house (including milk and eggs) and 13 of which I could not identify.

I get home from the store, set all the ingredients out on the table and call her again. Panicked.

Me: Mom. It says a cup of diced green onions. I just use the top part of the onion, right?

Mom: What do you mean the "top part?"

Meg: The stems. The green part.

Mom: Meg, this is kinda pathetic. You use the onion part of the green onion.

Me: Which is not the green part?

Mom: No, you need to use the bottom part. The part that looks like a goddamn onion.

Me: Ok, but there's like roots and crap coming off of that end.

Mom: Yes, you cut that part off. Then peel off the first layer. Then cut them. You can use a few cuts from the green for color if you want.

Me: Ok. Now it's also asking me to fold an egg. How the f**k do you fold an egg?

Mom: I'm not sure who is the bigger failure here. Me or you.

Me: I'm guessing you.

Mom: Meg, read carefully. It's a very easy recipe. And a crowd pleaser. Call if there are any other questions.

Twenty minutes later....

Mom: (sigh) Hello?

Me: Um, it says not to preheat the oven.

Mom: Right, you stick the dish in cold and then heat. That's the difference between heating and preheating.

Me: This is witchcraft.

Mom: Did you get the green onions cut?

Me: Well, I did what you said, but after I peeled off the first layer, more layers kept coming off and they just kept coming and coming until I was left with just a spindle of onion and I wasn't sure how to cut it so I just left them out.

Mom: Meg, onions are necessary. Is that the only thing you left off?

Me: No. I couldn't find dry mustard, so I just put in French's. And I didn't have brown sugar and I don't like mushrooms. Should be fine, right?

Mom: Meg, recipes aren't suggestions. You can't just pick and choose. Do you have a back up plan?


But somewhere between questioning how to cook sausage and learning how to use the "pulse" button on my hand-me-down Cuisinart, I relaxed a little, thinking of the next morning's event. My pregnant friend and her husband would be finding out she was having a girl in front of all her family. I smiled as I folded egg whites, thinking of when I found out I was having a girl of my own while my doctor smeared cold jelly on my belly.  The moment was beautiful and touching and my husband and I yelled out with excitement, watching a blizzard swirling around just outside the window, past the image of our child's squiggly outline.

And though it was a moment I will love forever, I couldn't help but think it could have been made better with an egg casserole. And when I thought about that, how this food was simply a vehicle to get people happy, full and in the mood to have a really great time, it took the pressure off being able to cook and put the focus on being able to please.

Cooking can be complicated and frustrating and difficult. Cooking is a science. And an art. If done really well, the way my mother does it, it's pulled off with ease and brings joy to everyone she serves. And I hoped this casserole, this pain-in-the-ass casserole, would help bring happiness to my pregnant friend and her husband and their family.

But just in case it didn't, I bought a box of cereal for back up.

My mother taught me well.

Syndication

Please check out my recent syndication on BlogHer:

 False Alarms: Negative Comments and Deleting Posts

Don't Believe Everything You Hear

In the shower, mid-shampoo, I hear a blaring noise pulsing in my ears. I jerk the shower curtain open but can't place the sound. I step out of the shower, covered in bubbles and dripping with water and fling open the bathroom door to discover our house alarm is going off.

Without thought or reservation, I bolt down the stairs, naked, wet and soapy. I run full speed, leaving alternating watery footprints on each stair. I hit the hardwood floors and skid my way into the kitchen, where the keypad for the alarm system sits yelling angrily above the kitchen table. I furiously type in the code, desperately trying to figure out what tripped the alarm. Was the back door pushed in? Did someone break a window in the basement and now waits in the stairwell for me? But the screen pops up, happy that I've entered the code, informing me there is the presence of smoke in the house.

And where there is smoke, there's fire.

I immediately check to see if the gas stove burners are on. I see they are all safely off. I race down to the basement, still naked, still wet and now shivering. I look in the laundry room and check the dryer hose. It's secure and cool. I walk through the house, arms clasped in front of my chest and a pillow covering my bikini wax, checking outlets and vents and every appliance.

I find no sign of fire. And by the time I calm down enough to understand there's no danger of fire, I am suddenly aware all the window blinds in our house are raised.

When I yell this story through the phone to my husband, he quietly mentions that the alarm might have been set off by the steam from my shower. That my three minutes of sudsy panic, thinking I was about to be murdered or burst into flames, was my own steamy fault.

He knew better.

Last week I posted an essay describing the seven types of college students. A silly, harmless satire about the common types of students I've seen during my years of teaching. Before I post any of my writing, I always pause and question whether this might possibly offend someone, or a group of people. Not that I worry unduly about offending people, but when one writes about parenting, or feminism, or marriage, it's bound to rub certain people the wrong way. I worry that I've over-simplified or over-complimicated an issue. Or I'm not seeing it from all sides. Or I'm not being patient enough and appreciating the little things in life. More than worrying about upsetting someone, I worry about being insensitive or polarizing. This is why I rarely post about my favorite One Direction member.

But I do think about these things. Even if only momentarily.

And yet, with the most recent post, in which I argue there are only seven types of college students, I didn't think a thing about it offending anyone. It was written in good fun and meant as a joke. And so I sent it off through my typical social media outlets to reach friends, family and former college professors. The feedback was positive. (Well, Facebook doesn't have a "dislike" button.) And then, as I've been doing of late, I sent it out to the vast world of the internet, where strangers lurk.

And within minutes I got bitch slapped. Several times over.

The first comment (all were "anonymous") said that I obviously had such little regard for my students that I was clearly an unfit teacher. One wrote that my "reductionist view on society" clearly indicated I was a "raging lunatic." Another said it was obvious I was the worst teacher who ever existed. One simply said: "I'm a graphic designer. I work hard." (He might not have actually read the entire post.) One said that all God's children are different and unique and cannot be classified in seven simple categories. And another said it was apparent that I had no conscience if I was willing to throw my students under the bus to promote my worthless writing.

These hit me so hard, I threw up. In my hand.

Not that I haven't had criticism before. And I've certainly had much worse said about me. Behind my back and to my face. I've been made fun of more than I care to remember. It's nearly impossible to get through junior high with a severe limp. But these comments hit me in a place that I had no idea any nerves existed: my ego. Not only was my writing being called into question, but so was my teaching. This wasn't saying my cooking or vacuuming skills lacked precision. This was criticizing the two things I really care about, and the two crafts at which I try the hardest. These internet lurking sons a bitches should have just called me a shitty mom and put me out of my misery.

While I was reading the comments, my eyes hot and my stomach churning, I felt like an alarm was going off in my head. And while I wasn't naked and wet and shivering, I did feel extremely exposed. And vulnerable. Instead of logically thinking through the comments, instead of considering that I was proud of the post and I meant it as a joke, instead of calmly considering the humorless rat bastards who were pointing fingers at me behind their protective 13 inch screens, I instead, immediately deleted my post.

These "anonymous" turds had won.

This is the world of social media. And message boards. And blogs. An insanely critical world in which people think that owning a laptop makes them a New Yorker critic. And I have to allow this because if I'm allowed to freely post whatever I want, they are allowed to comment on it. And while I wasn't writing about anything of consequence--thank god I didn't post my thoughts about military action in Syria--I have to allow people to react. Just like if I insist on taking showers of skin melting temperatures, I have to accept the smoke detector calling me on it.

Momentarily, I allowed the negative comments I received to change the way I viewed my writing. I instantly believed what was being written about me and my writing was true. It's easy to believe things you read and hear. About the world. Or yourself. A smoke detector blaring means there's a fire. And harsh criticisms of you are facts. So I can continue running around the house naked, assuming what I hear is truth. And I can continue to delete posts because a handful of people say they are horrible. Or I can develop a very important skill:

Detecting a false alarm.