Preparation:When we cook, we know what we get. If we follow the recipe just right, we end up with delicious food. I spent the afternoon following the delicate instructions to make chocolate mousse. I had to beat and stir each element separately, and make sure the chocolate was just above room temperature before I added the egg yolks, and fold in the egg whites at precise increments. It was a difficult task, but I knew that in several hours the mousse would set and my dinner guest and I would have a delicious desert.
Here is the tricky recipe for this delicious mousse.
People are not as easy or predictable. I'm very precise about my craigslist dinner invitations. I make sure each guest's responses are sincere and thoughtful, and I use polite but direct language when I answer their e-mails. But this week, I had all the ingredients and made half the food when I took a break and checked my e-mail. My dinner guest had e-mailed me and I thought perhaps it was a last minute question. This is what he said:
About tonight, I was talking to my boyfriend (news to me!) about it and he isn't entirely comfortable with the idea. Sex is not as big a deal for him, but this sounds too much like a date. I don't know what exactly was on the menu for tonight, but I feel I need to respect his wishes. Sorry to cancel last minute like this, I honestly thought he would be okay with it or I wouldn't have responded in the first place. It's a cool idea, and I hope someone takes you up on it. Too bad I'm not that guy.
People are unpredictable, they don't rise at certain temperatures and their flavor doesn't come out when simmered over low heat. Despite my preparations, I was left exactly the way I had hoped that this project would not leave me: alone.
Repairs:
But the food had been made and my hands were already stained with beet juice. This dinner would still happen and all the cute boys with boyfriends would not stop me. So, I called in the cavalry: one of my best friends and fellow writers. I tweaked the menu a little because she has a gluten allergy, but we made the most of the dinner.
You can make this raw dish by processing a cup of almonds and adding juice from half a lemon and some water until it's creamy. Then mix with cucumber, chopped dill and one garlic clove.
My friend is always there for me and luckily she's funny and cute (way cuter than my craigslist pick), so she was able to get me out of my funk with some jokes and funny stories. She is also an avid cook, but approaches food and cooking differently than I do, so her feedback and suggestions about my food was valuable.
I made this simple beet salad by microwaving the beets for just 1 minute. Then I marinated them in two tablespoons of oil, two tablespoons of vinegar, a splash of sherry, a half tablespoon of sugar, a few shakes of rosemary, dashes of salt and pepper, and some green onions.
Of course, I made my friend answer the questions of the week. She said that the most intense vegetable was rhubarb and her guilty pleasure (I had to clarify that I meant food because she raised her eyebrow in a naughty way) was unsweetened carob chips. She could eat a whole bag in one sitting.
Because my friend has a gluten allergy, I made a gluten-free version of the alfredo sauce and just dumped it over polenta instead of pasta. Weird, but still good.
My guest had two cooking disasters to share with me:
1. "I woke up early, about 7 in the morning and was really hungry. I went to the kitchen and started to make breakfast. I was going to have an omelet. It wasn't until the egg carton caught on fire and the kitchen was smoking that I realized I was still drunk from the night before."
2. "During the holidays my father likes to make really elaborate dishes and I sometimes help him. When I was a teenager, I was making some kind of cookies or something and I was looking at the recipe and it said 'mix by hand.' I thought it was kind of weird so I asked my dad, "Do I really mix it by hand? Doesn't that seem weird?" Without looking at me he just said yeah. The next time he turns around, he sees that I have my hands actually in the bowl with the egg yolks running all over and I'm caked in dough. He said that was one of my truly blond moments and my family tells that story at every holiday."
The rest of the dinner, we complained about boys and ate really huge wine glasses full of chocolate mousse.
The Stomach-Heart Revolution:
This week's fiasco and bitter disappointment led me to believe that something has to change with the dating and relationship scene. All the cool kids are into open relationships and casual sex and fucking you even though they have a boyfriend, but I can't find ONE decent man to just have dinner with me! I understand the queerness of alternative relationship structures and the argument that monogamous couples come from some sort of heternormative legacy, but I can't physically, mentally, or emotionally be one of those cool kids. Sometimes cool kids take things too far and they don't know what they're doing anymore. Where are their stomachs? Where are their hearts?
So, instead of letting it be cool, we should put our foot down. No more being nice to idiots who are fucking with us. No more being understanding of someone who's not being honest or stringing us along. We have little stomach-hearts and we need to use them. A stomach-heart is that earnest part of us that reacts with feelings, that can't help but fall for people when we are intimate with them, that tries to find the best in people even when there isn't any excuse for them, that is hungry for affection, that loves to love.
Next time we encounter an idiot, there will be no forgiveness. Tell them that casual sex is out, cheating is so not cool. Feelings are in. Cuddling is in. Waking up next to someone the morning after and then eating breakfast with them is hot. Calling people back or texting without evasiveness is cool. Curling up and reading a book out loud to a lover is our idea of perfection. Cooking dinner for a boyfriend and talking for hours while eating is what everyone's doing. Get with it.
Stomach-hearts out there: we are the future.
And a tiny little epilogue:
So, to bring my cooking metaphor full circle: Although lovers and relationships don't work like recipes, friends are like Betty Crocker cake mix. You barely do anything. Just add oil and eggs and throw it in the oven, but it works out every time. Light and fluffy and sweet. Friends are always there for you and it just works without asking questions. I mean, sure you have to bake them a (gluten-free!) cake once in a while, but once friendships are made, once you figure each other out, they are like bottomless pits of stomach-heart. Thank you, friend.