Sweating the Small Stuff

Some people ponder big philosophical questions — the meaning of life, who wrote the book of love. Weighty stuff like that. Me? I’m stuck sweating the small stuff. What’s the difference between a large and a small shallot? Can I refreeze meat I’ve already taken out of the freezer? And do you have to rinse dishes before loading the dishwasher?

Happily, I am not alone in my kitchen befuddlement.

Sweating the Small Stuff: Cherries!

The weighty Washington Post, home of political punditry galore, pivots nicely each week to our domestic needs in a live chat appropriately called “Cooking Chat.” There various cooking mavens answer the pressing culinary questions of the day such as “What can I make with sour cherries?” and “My ratatouille sat out for 18 hours. Is it safe to eat?”

Now, while I don’t care about sour cherries or ratatouille, I do care — care deeply — about the nagging and oh, so nasty dishrag vs. sponge dilemma: Which is fouler?

The answer? Both! Both are gross and potentially hold E. coli, salmonella, campylobacter (a new yucky term for me), and other bacteria.

To this stomach-turning intel, I say, “Long live the paper towel! Long may her pristine E. coli-free sheets be unfurled.”

Sometimes reader queries to newspaper cooking columns are poignant. One woman penned this soul-searching inquiry:

“I’m intimidated by cooking meat. Where do I start?”

This, to me, is not a cooking question. It is a cry for help. Was the reader scared by a steer as a child? Hunted by a moose on the loose, rejected by a llama or her mama?

Instead of turning to a cooking columnist, I believe this individual would be better served writing to the newspaper’s advice columnist.

Sweating Small Stuff: The Yoke is on Me

As for me, my central culinary dilemma is well-documented. It is baking. As a teen, I couldn’t tell an egg white from a yoke … and that is no joke. I had to call my aunt, long-distance, on day rates, mid-recipe, for the answer!

To this day, I cannot separate the white from the yoke without the dreaded seepage! Over the years, I have acquired a drawer full of supposedly fool-proof gadgets designed to aid in that task. Well, the designers of these gadgets hadn’t met this fool. So, sadly, my souffles never rise to the occasion, and my whipped cream never whips up to dazzling peaks.

I am so egg-challenged that I even took a personality test to determine my best method for cracking eggs! It said I was risk-averse and should avoid eggs … and farms.

And my baking woes don’t end with my egg-agonies. My icing is always lumpy or runny. My batter is always over or under-cooked.

Plus, now that we’ve moved to high-altitude Northern Nevada, my bad baking has worsened.

My cakes won’t rise or, on the rare occasion when they do, they collapse pancake-flat as soon as I remove them from the oven. I even bought a special baking-at-high altitudes-cook book. It didn’t help. Maybe it’s not the altitude, just my attitude! I dunno.

Sweat-Free Eating

Yet, while my general cooking skills are lacking, and my baking skills  are a flop, I take comfort in four facts:

1. Eating out is an inalienable right. (I’m pretty sure it’s in the Constitution.)
2. Ordering in is super easy.
3. Bakeries are plentiful and always delicious.
4. Science has recently determined that ice cream is good for us!

Fortified by these four facts, I now face only one conundrum: to eat out or order in? Decisions, decisions! Tonight maybe I’ll let Handsome Hubby choose. It’s good to let the man decide, don’t you agree? In my case, it distracts HH from the fact that I haven’t cooked a meal in 77 days. Or is it 78?

But who’s counting? I mean, after all, why sweat the small stuff anyway?