Anyone can cook….

OK, I know that I have just stolen a line from a movie character (and an animated rat no less), but I truly feel that anyone can cook.

It amazes me when people tell me that they can’t cook. “Of course you can!” is always my reply. Most of these people still insist that they can’t, and I always wonder what makes them lack the confidence it takes to open up a cookbook and just go to town. There is nothing I love more than parking in the cookbook section of a book store. When I receive my Everyday Food Magazine in the mail every month, I sit down and read it cover to cover, trying to decide on the recipe I will attempt first. What’s great is that now my daughter is in on the action. She likes nothing better than to be my assistant.

What happened to the women who would turn out pot roasts and jello molds, organize pot luck dinners and bake sales?  My mom worked, and there was still dinner on the table every night, and she did the recipe swaps with co-workers, pot luck dinners and bake sales.

I guess that the reason that I love to be in the kitchen so much is because of my mom. My fondest and earliest childhood memories are of being in the kitchen with my mom, stirring something, working the mixer, lining up the ingredients on the counter. Reading off directions to my mom was one of the ways I learned how to read. One of my most vivid memories is the day when I was helping my mom make chocolate chip cookies and I lifted the mixer without turning it off.  My 1970’s Marcia Brady pigtails immediately got sucked into the beaters, and I was a cookie dough mess. But that didn’t stop me in the kitchen – a long soak in the bath to release me from the beaters and I was back in the kitchen.

A classmate from highschool recently renovated her apartment for the possibility of being forced to sell. She posted pictures of the kitchen remodel on facebook and I said “WOW the things you can do with that 6-burner stove!”. She told me that she didn’t know how to cook, that she always ordered or went out. I challenged her to try. I told her I would teach her, gave her some good sources for recipes, offered to come over and give lessons. I don’t know if I was the inspiration, or her beautiful new kitchen, but slowly she started. She opened cookbooks, hunted for recipes, gave it a go. And you know what she discovered? That she can cook, and she’s not so bad. She has started having dinner parties, and is even taking a class in Italian Cuisine at the CIA. And I am so proud of her efforts!

So if you are one of those people who thinks you can’t, just try. You may be slow to start, but I know you can do it. Cooking/baking is simply following a set of instructions. There may be some trial and error – hey, even I have some flops in the kitchen. But the kitchen is very forgiving. You can learn from your mistakes, and start the recipe fresh the next time, using what you have learned. You may not be a food geek like me – I cried when my husband brought home a 5Qt. KitchenAid stand mixer a few weeks ago – but you don’t have to be. Go to the library, take out some cookbooks, talk to friends to see what they recommend, buy a food magazine. Then start at the beginning – buy the ingredients, line them up on the counter, and start from the first step. Trust me, once you make one or two recipes, I think you will gain confidence and realize – Anyone CAN cook!