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Saturday, September 14, 2013

What Happens When I Bake

I love feeding people. Nature or nurture, I don't know, but I do know that every time we visit my very Filipina grandma the first thing she says (after "Oh! You're getting so big!") is, "Are you hungry? Do you want something to eat?"
Add to that the years of game nights with friends and family that start and end clustered in the kitchen, and it becomes easier to see why I give away the majority of the food I create.
There's a definite pattern to the disappearance of my baking bonanzas and cooking culminations. First is the creation, which is occasionally interrupted by knocks on the door from Christian's empty-fridge-neighbor Luke and "what smells so good?!" from passers-by. Then is the hand-slapping until I deem the baking/cooking ready for ingestion, which is occasionally too reminiscent of scolding the family pet.

Finally the consumption commences, starting with whoever happens to be in the room at the elusive moment when the food is "cool enough" or simply "done." I eat some. Christian normally eats some, unless he's trying to be healthy and the product is definitely not (and even then I'll catch him sneaking little nibbles). I go knock on the neighbors' doors, and they eat some.


Once, after christening a pie plate with 7-layer dip, one neighbor told another and he came to eat some, too. If it's baked goods, I put some on a plate and bring it to the across-the-hall neighbor who I've never talked to aside from these exchanges and asking for a hammer.
(As an alternative to this series of knocks, I sometimes post the mandatory food portfolio pictures straight to Facebook, and then the neighbors come knocking themselves. This did backfire on them once, though, when they thought the newly added pictures of bread were different from the loaf they had eaten earlier that day. They weren't.)
If, however, there's still some of whatever it was left after the horde descends and it's best eaten fresh or if it's too dangerous to sit and tempt me in the kitchen (or both - looking at you, Brazilian cheese bread puffs), then I pack it up and tote it along wherever I'm going that day. Chocolate-chip cookie-dough chocolate cupcakes go to my friends' dorm. 
The aforementioned cheese bread tags along to ballroom practice, where the inimitably exuberant Sandy gushes her undying affection for me: "OH MY GAWD I LOVE YOU. Can I seriously eat more? Really? You are the BESSST. THANK YOU!!!" (Note: If you know Sandy, you should agree that the multiple exclamation marks are necessary.)

Then I go back to the room to find that Christian has been snacking mindlessly while he programs, so I rescue the remaining food (and save some for myself).

Throughout the rest of the day, I normally keep eating until I recognize that I'm sliding back and forth along a familiar teeter-totter of self-congratulation for being such an amazing cook and self-deprecation for WHAT AM I DOING how did that cookie get in my hand?!




So I resume offering the goodies to people, often a little more insistently this time around.
Living in college dorms may not be great for privacy or feng shui or flu outbreaks, but it sure makes it easier to share food and do what I love.

I love feeding people. I love the initial moment of disbelief when I offer them a fresh-baked cookie or steaming plate of spaghetti. I love the unadulterated joy that lights up their faces when I reassure them that yes, I'm serious, please help yourself. I love the sounds of contentment that people unconsciously make as they indulge themselves just because, the tell-tale combination of eyes-shut-throat-humming. I love knowing that I've made their day just a little better. I love thinking that maybe I've helped assuage a hunger that goes beyond the stomach.

Crawfish Etouffe-ish

My love of cooking and baking undeniably stems partially (majorly) from my upbringing. My whole family loves food, though we of course have our own favorites. Combine this with the thriftiness (not cheapness!) trait that seems to have been passed on from both sides of the family, and the results are creatively delicious. Casseroles? Not in our house. Fried rice is served with leftover jerk chicken. Overnight French toast from homemade French bread. Ribs, sausage, corned beef, turkey - you name it, it's been in a sandwich.
In college, this heritage has expanded to a whole new level. Why buy food to cook with when there's plenty available in the university cafeteria? With the introduction of reusable to-go containers last year, I don't even have to sneak in Tupperware in my backpack. One of my friends used baked potatoes from the grill line for his Thanksgiving potluck mashed potatoes. When they put out the good apples (read: not Red "Delicious"), I snag four and two more Granny Smiths to make my award-winning pie.




Some people take it even further. They go for the display vegetables, the onions/zucchini/carrots that are displayed in front of the food as if to imply that yes, this really does have real carrots in it, look there are some right there.
The cafeteria isn't the only venue for "free" food. At the end of every school year, the Residence Hall Association holds their annual crawfish boil - and this year I was ready. Once Christian and I had eaten our fill, he peeled our leftovers (and another batch straight from the pot) to use later. Trevor, a Louisiana mostly-native, had told me about crawfish etouffe, and I wanted to give it a try.
Styrofoam container in hand, I looked up a recipe, and we started cooking… and then started running into problems.
"Okay, now we add the fish broth… Oh wait. We don't have fish broth."
"Should we go get some?"
"Nah. Hey, here's some canned tuna. If we use the juice from that, do you think it counts as fish broth?"
"...no."
"...almond milk it is!"
Two minutes later
"Alright, it's simmering. Now add the tomato paste."
"Where's the tomato paste?"
"Oh. We don't have that either."
[Trevor makes the face of disapproval.]
"But here's some pasta sauce!"
"I'm hungry. Close enough."
Four minutes later:
"'Cajun seasoning'? That's kind of vague. You're from Louisiana, what's 'Cajun seasoning'?"
"I don't know, I normally just eat it. Pepper?"
"How about I Google it?"

In the end, we wound up just throwing it all together and serving it over (healthy!) brown rice. Trevor said it wasn't really crawfish etouffee, so I compromised, and it now lives on in history as the infamous crawfish etouffee-ish.

Expectations vs. Reality

I'm one of those people who will laugh out loud when Fred and George offer to send their little sister a toilet seat, or tear up unconsciously when Moreta risks herself to save the entire planet of Pern. Books come alive to me, thanks to a (sometimes overly) vivid imagination. But what is a boon in reading and impromptu story-telling takes its toll when it comes to other scenarios, like going on vacations or receiving mail. My expectations do sometimes occasionally every so often run rampant. A dropped box of cereal at the grocery store becomes the "meet cute" opening to a romcom blockbuster. A friend's birthday party becomes the beginning of a zombie apocalypse. And my boyfriend's "efficiency-style" university apartment becomes a utopian culinary creation zone.
The fridge will be stocked to the brim with fresh veggies and fruit, high-quality cuts of meat for dinner parties, condiments for every type of cuisine imaginable, and lots of freezer burritos. LOTS.
With this combination of resources, I will cook delicious, healthy meals at least every couple of days, and eat the leftovers in between. Oh, nothing too fancy, of course. I'm nothing if not realistic. Maybe some (non-dairy*) fettuccini carbonara, some onion rings, fresh bread, a starter of stuffed mushrooms followed by poached salmon with a hollandaise sauce followed by chocolate souffle and raspberry whipped cream… anyway. At any rate, my ratios of veggie/fruit/protein/starch would be strictly textbook (thank you USDA).
However, I know that expectations of situations are rarely met. This isn't always a bad thing - I already have my tall, dark, and handsome, and he gets the cereal for me. I'm sure the rest of the guests at the party were glad that there was no imminent zombie attack (but the stockpile of plastic knives I had in my purse would have been easier to explain). But when it comes to an efficiency-style dorm kitchen… even halfway-met expectations would be an improvement from reality.

Don't get me wrong, having (essentially) my own kitchen again is amazing. But growing up with a kitchen according to my mom's standards effectively spoiled me for any other kitchens out there. Granite counter-tops are replaced by 3 square feet of laminate. An electric range with glass top gives way to crooked burners that I hope were originally this color. Cabinets for every pot, pan, and pancake griddle yield to bookshelves pressed into service as pantries. And much as I love cooking and baking with helpers, it gets a little crowded on those peeling parquet tiles.
The fridge is fairly well-stocked, thanks to grab-n-go meals from the campus greasy spoon and an almost-unlimited meal plan. Others with less of a penchant (and/or less time) for cooking, not so much. Christian's next-door neighbor/best friend Luke finished his senior year with his fridge containing the following: one bottle of good beer, a stick of butter, and a partial bottle of vodka that wouldn't fit in our other friend's freezer.
And the stick of butter was mine, leftover from an oatmeal raisin cookie extravaganza.

Finally, as much as I would have loved to cook more often, I am at college primarily for my education, not to eat. With the aforementioned meal plan, my normal cooking schedule was less of a schedule and more of a "I have two hours before ballroom rehearsal and that exam that was supposed to be tomorrow got moved to next week so let's see what's in the fridge to cook with." I cleaned up my act second semester while training for ballroom and my first half-marathon, but I will admit that I was initially ingesting a burger and fries several times a week. Not exactly healthy, regardless of the veggies and whole-wheat bun, but it's hard to beat free food.
Overall, while the initial reality was less than ideal, in the words of Tim Gunn, we "made it work." I expanded the counter space with the provided dresser, a cheapo bookshelf, and a piece of scrap MDF from my family's old Murphy-bed frame. My spices aren't alphabetized in their own drawer, but at least I have plenty, thanks to Mom. The small space forced me to get creative with storage options, too. The cabinets weren't much, but the extra bookshelf, a shower organizer on the wall, and some reshuffling meant that one of the built-ins was dedicated solely to baking supplies, while the other retired to a comfortable life as storage for the ever-present "miscellaneous." Mom's upgrades in the home kitchen meant excellent hand-me-downs in terms of cookware, and Christmas/my birthday brought my very own Kitchenaid stand mixer and Cuisinart food processor.

When I finally reined in my expectations and decided to work with what I had, it wasn't half-bad. Okay, maybe quarter-bad - the Great Roach Hunt of 2013 can be another post - but still better than nothing. And even with those limitations, I think the results were still pretty darn good.



*This will most likely be mentioned over and over, as Christian is my most frequent food recipient/fellow chef. He has an allergy to something or other protein in milk, which is different from my own (often-ignored) lactose intolerance. What this means is that the kitchen is often free of dairy interlopers like milk and butter and *tear* cream, although I normally have a packet or two of Easy Mac stashed behind the natural peanut butter. It also sometimes poses interesting challenges in food preparation, but we unfailingly rise to the occasion.