The Ad Hoc Chef

I've been absent for a while. I was enjoying myself, getting little things to work, spending time with Leslie, going to Dragon*con, or most recently, reading intensively for class and playing Spore.

It's been a month since I've moved in. Most days, I've cooked or prepared meals for myself, the exceptions being when we go out or when Leslie makes something for both of us because it's just as much trouble as cooking for one.

I haven't cooked for myself this much before. At college, I always relied on the dining plans offered to me because I was living in a dorm without handy access to more than a microwave and a microfridge. In some senses, that was good - I always ate a warm meal, I always had plenty to eat, and I never had to put any time into preparing the food. However, it left me apprehensive of cooking for myself, was inefficient cost-wise, and made me reliant on whatever the menu happened to be.

During this summer, and summers previously, I would make lunch for myself, but those were either occasional or, in the case of the pretty good Thai noodle boxes, also cost-inefficient. So without much forethought I had a gas oven, lots of food I picked from the grocery without much insight into how to combine them, and cooking implements I knew how to use in theory. Oh, and a hungry tummy to act as impetus.

I shouldn't have been scared, though. I was imagining all of these possible disasters, when really the worst that could've happened was me messing up a meal. And I'm happy to say I haven't messed one up yet.

When I make instant noodles, that's nearly impossible to not mess up. The same goes with pasta and rice; I learned to boil water in high school, adding an ingredient into the mix wasn't any trouble. The same goes for boiling or simmering formerly frozen vegetables. As for things like mushrooms (one of my favorite foods to prepare, baking or sauteeing them), the packaging instructions carried me most of the way. Turning raw red or white pieces of chicken and pork into fully cooked portions I could be proud of isn't that difficult either, provided I remember to season them and don't scorch the pan.

And so I have meals like last night, where I threw together scrambled eggs (how I did it I'm still not sure... I whisked the eggs, put the eggs in a pan, and then made sure they didn't burn... right?), baked some mushrooms coated in peanut oil in a shallow pan at 450 degrees F for 10 minutes or so, and then put some jam on bread. Or I'll pop a calzone into a microwave. Or I'll boil up some pasta, toss some soy sauce in there, and whip up some corn as a side. It's fun. And my reputation of never more than three ingredients has become a cooking mantra. It really helps focus the selection, helps me not get overwhelmed. Yeah, I'll get around to recipes sometime. But right now, with the reading I still have to finish and the video game I want to get to and so on and so forth... I'll just cook to eat. And since it still happens to taste pretty good, who's to complain?