One of the greatest challenges for most Single Dads is the dreaded “C” word. Stop get your mind out of the gutter my kids read my blogs. I’m talking about “C”ooking. Not sure what y’all were doing back in the day when cooking lessons were offered, BUT I know what I was doing recess. Needlesstosay, my first forays into the kitchen were instant classics. Heck I remember my 1st culinary masterpiece Browned hamburger, cowboy beans, peas, 5 slices of American cheese, and for that added crunch ¾ of a bag of extra crispy potato chips crumbled up on top. Now no comments until you try it because it still is go to comfort food!
However, now you find your self as head cook and bottle washer. Our good rich..very rich..friends at the Arches, the Big headed King’s place, the Daughter’s place and the Colonels place have made it very easy for you to put a meal on the table. Heck they’ve made it so easy that your table becomes portable and if traffic is just right, the meal can be consumed before you get home. This means NO DIRTY DISHES!!! The food has to be good for you because they put nutritional labels on the bag the food comes in, and they no longer use Styrofoam so you aren’t hurting the environment. Truly life is good and you have mastered the whole “meal” thing.
If this is your idea on Family eating, I am wondering why you are even reading my blogs. Obviously the health of you and your children is secondary to the convenience of fast ready to eat meals. I’m here to tell you that cooking being difficult is a bunch of BS. The only real hard part to cooking is cleaning up the dishes and I do believe that one of God’s plans for kids was to be their parent’s dishwashers. After all you worked for the money to pay for the groceries to cook the food which they chowed down on; someone has got to clean up after wards. I volunteer the kids.
So how to you learn to cook? The same way a famous shoe/sporting goods company wants you to do anything..Just Do It. I learned a valuable lesson from my Mother-in-Law. English was not her native tongue, and she learned English and how to cook by reading cook books. However, many fancy cooking terms don’t translate perfectly. For example..a cook book might have you add chopped onions and mushrooms and bell pepper and bread crumbs and an egg to lean hamburger meat, add a dash of salt and pepper, mix it all together and form 4 or 6 patties. Simple right? Ok the next step is fry the patties in a little oil or butter. Now most of you reading this have a mental picture of a hot skillet with patties cooking away. To a non English speaking person “fry” is what you to do chicken and chicken wings. Know what happens when you drop a patty into a vat of hot oil? The egg oozes out making a spider looking thing while the meat shrivels into a hockey puck. Now here is the lesson I learned. Don’t flush your mistake down the toilet as it will clog your pipes. Double wrap it in newspaper and throw it away, taking the garbage to the can yourself. My point is as you learn to cook expect mistakes..glorious still talk about them to this day mistakes. Toss them and start over.
Involve your kids, watch the food channel together and try to make the dishes. You can go online and get the step by step recipes. Give each child their own night to come up with what they want. Grocery shop together and make the meal as a Family project. As for the surf and turf and pasta…Take a hot dog (ok everything doesn’t have to be organic and 100% top of the food chart healthy) slice the bottom half length wise once on each side, drop into boiling water. The “legs” will curl out making the hot dog look like an octopus (surf), make a macaroni (pasta) and cheese (turf..from cows) box, prepare some frozen peas or corn or lima beans. There your have if Dad’s Famous and never to be forgotten Surf and Turf and Pasta.
Now go do what you have to do to…
Make it a super day,
Kevin
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