Confession: I love food. I hate food. I am terrified of food. Simultaneously.
I'm not writing about loving/hating/being terrified of EATING food today (I'm going to continue holding out on you all and just indulging the white coat in the white room with the white notepad thankyouverymuch)...I'm writing about COOKING it.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE to cook. I bake a wicked apple pie. I make a Honey-Dijon baked chicken that is amazing. My manicotti...to die for. I've cooked for people in the past, and I will cook for people in the future (in fact, next week, which is what spurred this totally neurotic post) but I am so terrified of cooking for others IN MY HOME that it's nearly painful. It's not about serving bad food, I have never made anything bad save for a pie crust I made when I was ten years old. 1 C sugar + 1 C flour + 1 C water DOES NOT EQUAL pie crust. It equals rock hard mess. When I'm going to throw caution to the wind and try something that has the potential to be terrible, I try it on myself. In secret. And if it was bad I never speak of it to ANYONE, except perhaps my best friend who would never judge, just laugh.
No, it's not the actual food that terrifies me, but what could go wrong in the process of cooking it. Tonight, while I was at work (where I, surprise surprise, cook for others. I'm telling you, this is all really beyond neurotic), I brainstormed some of my fears. Here is a short list.
*The oven will blow up while I am using it. If that wasn't bad enough, shards of metal and glass will shoot into me and the whole building will go up in flames. The fire department will come. I will be...wait for it, wait for it...embarrassed.
*My kitchen will fill up with smoke, the smoke detector will go off, the evidence of my loss of control over the situation will be absolutely impossible to erase before said guest arrives. (This fear is so old and so real that I actually take the batteries out of my smoke detector while I'm cooking because I am positive that the godawful beeping and dreadful flat voice uttering 'Fire! Fire! Fire!' does absolutely NOTHING to help the situation. I also keep the kitchen window wide open, which is how my super always knows to find a reason for an apartment visit right as cupcakes come out of the oven.)
*The meal will catch on fire inside the oven...but the oven will not blow up...I will, all of a sudden, no longer be able to operate a simple fire extinguisher.
*The oven door will slam shut on my arms while I am putting food in or taking food out. My arms won't just be burnt to hell, they will come off. Into the food.
*I will stab myself in the palm while prepping and bleed out into my unprepared meal and no one will find me and I will die. The worst part of this one is the anxiety is less about the bleeding out an dying and more about the not following through and feeding my guest part. I shake my head at myself.
Really. This is insane. I am going to spend the next week hyperventilating in the back of my mind over a meal I've already planned out start to finish, that I am REALLY EXCITED ABOUT MAKING because it is for someone else! I might PRACTISE the damn thing. I will wrack my best friend and my coworker's brains for tips about food prep and how to make this a 'foolproof' endeavour. But honestly, if I'm going into this CONVINCED my oven is going to blow up, I'm not terribly sure what any of them are going to be able to say to make it okay...
Oh and quick note. The title of this post is a quote from a dear friend of mine who never lets me prepare my own meal at the shop (on principle, he says food tastes better when someone else makes it for you, especially when you spend all day cooking/serving others). I adore you, M!
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