Look, I just don't cook from scratch much these days. Generally speaking, I'm capable of being a damn good cook, but for the last couple of years I've been incredibly reluctant. I'm also far more prone to messing up than I used to be. I even found myself overcooking good old mac 'n' cheese the other day because I wasn't paying close enough attention.
I blame DramaBoy, really, or rather the food sensitivities he had for so long. I had to focus so much on food and what was in it and finding special foods and cooking everything from scratch. It was overwhelming. Couple that with major depression, and I burned out.
You'd think that this would have faded with so much time. It has been two years, after all. Surely I'd have rebounded by now. And in some ways I have. I don't hate being in the kitchen like I did for a while. I find myself quite willing to be part of a cooking team, in fact. But cooking alone and every day? I still dislike it. Strongly.
Nevertheless, when Lauren posted about making Pizza Loaf, a variation on one of the meals I actually loved at boarding school, nostalgia worked its magic. Besides, I thought the recipe looked simple enough.
Ha.
I should have known better. Lauren is one of those women who makes things look easy. I love her, but like my sister, there are times when it's a really good thing I do, because that stupid inferiority complex of mine comes surging to the surface. Just sayin'.
(And I didn't giggle AT ALL over her post the other day confessing that she and her beautiful children are, in fact, human. I'd never do something like that.)
I SWEAR I followed her instructions. But I was all stressed and chaotic and whatnot, like that's anything out of the ordinary, and it took a lot longer than it should have and my pizza loaf was huge and falling apart and had holes where it shouldn't and I forgot the cheese and had to open it back up to put cheese in and it looked like a Huge Mess.
Oy.
I felt like crying. I got crabby with MTL instead, because of course I didn't cook this massive meal for just me and my two kidlets. Oh no, I tried out a completely new recipe involving dough from scratch while cooking for other people in an unfamiliar kitchen. I AM SPECIAL THAT WAY.
I baked the damn thing anyway, and it turned out okay. Just okay, not fabulous, but good enough that I decided that perhaps, with a little tweaking and practice and maybe, oh I don't know, FOCUS, perhaps it would be worth trying again.
In a few months.
Until then, I'm going to practice making mac 'n' cheese.
4 bits of love:
I'll take your word for it with the toast.
But isn't toast incredibly important? I mean really, toast is key. I am about to have my bedtime cheese toast, for instance, and I expect it to make my evening.
I never like pizza loaf anyway. At school, it was always so dry!! (I know, there was sauce to put on it, but that stuff was not that great, either). So anyhow, I bet your pizza loaf was way better than boarding school's!!!
I keep thinking that if we cook enough, it must get easier and take less time. That hasn't happened for me, yet, though. The only thing that has sped it up is "adopting" an 18 year old who likes to cook and offers to chop vegetables whenever I'm making something. Maybe you should consider an 18 year-old addition to the household??? ;)
- SoccerSister
If it's any consolation, I tried to do a "simple" roast chicken that I've done a MILLION times before and it ended up taking nearly two hours to bake (and even then I had to microwave the stuffing in the middle, for fear that it would be salmonella-laden).
I was not well pleased eating at 8:45 pm, with a tired little boy bouncing around. He ate all the chicken on his plate, though.
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