I have had multiple… shall we call them… “situations” revolving around cooking food. Maybe it started when I was a little girl trying to get out of school. I knew my parents wouldn’t let me stay home unless I was running a fever, so my genius-level brain came up with the plan to hold the glass mercury thermometer over the boiling pasta my mom was cooking for dinner. I figured the hot steamrolling over the glass tube of death would heat up, proving that I was too ill to attend class in the morning.
As you can imagine, it did heat up, so hot, that it busted open, emptying the mercury directly into the al adente pasta my family was soon to consume. I knew my parents would figure out my deviant plan, and retribution would be swift. I thought I could hide it from my parents, but fortunately, my little soul couldn’t live with the guilt, so I came clean. Sort of. I explained that I was looking at the light under the stove’s fan to how high my fever was, and then it somehow blew up in my hand. I mean, come on, Mom, what kind of death device were you putting into my mouth. You really should be more careful next time. Needless to say, we didn’t eat the mercury-laced pasta that night.
Cooking as a Young Adult
My cooking “situations” continued long into my young adult years. One year for Thanksgiving I was unable to go home for the holiday, I decided to take on the adventure of cooking my own turkey feast. I remember my Mom filling the bird with stuffing. So, I shoved the dressing in the bird, only to find out that it wasn’t cooking properly. To remedy this situation, I took the stuffing out and continued to cook the turkey. My bird finally cooked and it was time to enjoy the fruits of my labor. But I forgot one tiny little detail… I was eating stuffing that had been sitting in raw turkey juices.
Now when I say it made me sick… there are no words to accurately describe the pain that I was in for the 3 days following. I still, to this day, shudder at the thought of stuffing. The experience has been ruined me for life.
Today the amount of cooking I do is limited to eating a bowl of cereal over the kitchen sink, foods I can microwave, or dishes that only require one pan to prepare. I live alone, and I’m single… wow, that sounds bleak. They even have a section in the grocery store freezer that is for people like me. Dinner for 1 person that takes 4 minutes to cook. Done.
Home Chef to the Rescue
One of my dear friends who has faith in me signed me up for “Home Chef” this last Christmas. Their website describes it,
“Home Chef is a weekly subscription meal kit service. Customers receive orders with all the fresh ingredients you need to make restaurant-quality recipes designed by our chefs. We save you the time of going to the grocery store, finding new recipes, meal planning, and portioning.”
I was up for the challenge. I picked out my meals for the following week and waited for my home delivery. My first box came, and I was impressed by how the portioning was spot on, and the recipes were straightforward to follow, even for me. So far, I haven’t poisoned myself or my dog Crash… that’s a bonus. I notice that I have to time cooking when my Parkinson’s meds are “on” because working with knives when you don’t have confidence that your body can be dangerous.
I’m a chef!
I have learned a lot about my adventures. I now know how to zest a lemon, mince garlic, dice onions, season a pan, and what it means to let your meat rest. Crash has also enjoyed my adventures in cooking because part of his job description as Sous-chef is tasting everything before it reaches the plate.
This leads me to questions for my readers. Have you ever tried one of these meal kits? Do you like cooking? Do you have any fun, or strange stories about cooking?
Haha I love this so much! You truly are a chef and a wonderful chef indeed’! I love hearing about all your cooking stories. You make work fun! Thank you for being you 😁😁
Awww, thanks Nicole. 😘
My husband and I both like to cook, but my PD makes me pretty useless around dinner time. He has taken over meals, but if there is some prep I can do earlier in the day, I like to contribute in that way. BTW there are butcher’s gloves (around $10 on Amazon) that make cutting meat or vegies safer. ..a metal mesh glove with a cotton under-glove to protect the non-cutting hand. I usually make salads for our dinner around 4:00 before my “down” time. We often get Little Big Meals at Fresh Market, a grocery store, that includes ingredients and instructions for dinner for 4 for $20, and we eat half the meal a day or two later reheated.
Kim,
Thank you for sharing your experience. Great suggestions!
I lived in Italy for a few years during which time cajoled my closest amici who owned restaurants to confide their recipes with me. They never would so I got skilled at culinary reverse engineering. Never have been able to get the horse right though, like the Southern Italians do it. (Just kidding, I only had it once in Napoli with a bunch of Carabinieri). Also sorry to hear about the steam pipe busting after ingesting uncooked turkey. Similar experience for me after eating possum just off the Appalachian Trail. At the risk of sounding pretentious I am my favorite cook. I get what I want, when I want, exactly the way I want. Thank you Allison. As always I appreciate you and your unselfish efforts in all you do.
I haven’t tried any of these meal kits but maybe I should after salivating over the pics you posted, I do enjoy my wine delivery service!
As Susan said my “PD witching hour” comes around dinner time also. We’ve been ordering dinners from
Cook Unity (not for every night but 4 or so nights a week). They come fully prepared (aren’t frozen) and there
are lots of choices. I applaud your cooking efforts though and love your blog!
I’ve tried HelloFresh as well. Great concept but too much going on at one time in the kitchen. For example cutting potatoes slicing dicing tomatoes and onions. Just too much for me. Dinner comes around my “PD witching hour“ , where I turn into the crankiest wife and mom around. The kitchen is not my friend, so I stick to very simple things.
I can’t cook when I’m off . I have no tremors just painfully ridgid muscles particularly iñ my back and neck, I have to be on to cook and by the time I’m done in the meal is ready I’m too off to eat it
Ha! After setting my dressing gown on fire for the second time, my (now) husband banned me from the kitchen! I have always been a rubbish and unwilling cook, so PD has at least made me feel less ashamed about not preparing meals for anyone!
Posy you and I share the same opinion about cooking but would love to overcome that obstacle. It sounds like Ally is on to something. I think I’ll try it out and see how it goes. Keep you posted!
Thanks Allison for the hot tip. Love ❤️ you!
I like to do a little cooking now and again. I have a few standards that really open people’s eyes and taste buds. One of my favorites is roast leg of salmon. It can be paired with a nice Pinot Noir using bluetooth, a craft beer from Oregon. The one I prefer is “burn it ALL, YALL”
I was cooking today as a matter of fact. The dish was ‘le bon leftover with retreded curly fries, They were really just two eggs over easy, on a bed of Retary. Mmmm good.
Leg of salmon?
Pete, roast leg of salmon?! Ha ha!
LMAO
Thank you!
Thinking about retaining a professional food taster when we next visit .
My spouse and I are hopelessly uninterested in cooking. So we get Hello Fresh meals four times a week. It’s good food and not bad to prepare. Now if could only figure out when I can eat without protein interfering with my levodopa, it would be great. Take meds 1/2 hour after a meal or wait two hours after eating to take the meds. So I wind up sometimes eating at 10pm, and I’m not French 😉. You described this dilemma in one of your blogs. Something about frozen yogurt.
Nice Blog — You do a great job!!!!!
Thank you guys!