I Killed the Cookie Sheet...

No, I really did kill it. There's no coming back from what it went through.

But first I want to tell you how nicely it all started.

I woke up at 7:30 this morning, which merits a wag of the finger at me for not using the super sweet sun-blocking shades that replace the regular shades with the correct flick of the wrist. Trouble is, I don't know how to flick my wrist to get it right. Nonetheless, I was up early on a Saturday.

Early on a Saturday meant the Union Square Farmers' Market for me. I found a parking spot really close to the PATH and hopped on. When I got to Union Square I was delighted to see University St. blocked off for additional street vendors, which I think they must do once a month but that's only a guess.

Before getting food, a woman must get jewelry. At least this woman did. And for a steal, too! The next thing I want to add to my (puny) repetoire is jewelry making. I wonder if it will turn out as well my cooking...

Next, I walked through the farmers' market and dodged hipsters on bicycles and old women with carts muttering in yiddish. After about two passes through the whole thing I finally worked up the nerve to start buying. And buy I did! I had no idea what I was going to make, but I knew if I didn't start purchasing I would be wallowing in regret later. Here's my booty ------>

Looks pretty good, yeah? I know you're probably surprised by the eggplant and zucchini and maybe even the portobellos, but my Mom makes two of my favorite meals out of those bits so I knew what they looked like. Otherwise, forget it!

And I tossed the muffin...it wasn't great and I knew if I kept it I'd probably hoover the mediocre muffin later.

After running back out to SoHo to get things from work, lugging them to my car, going to B&N to buy the on hold Season 1 of Madmen only to find out that had given me Season 2... I finally went home to make my dinner. (By the way, this sound like a short trip or short day. It's not. It took about 40 minutes to get to work, 40 walk/subway back to my car, 15 to walk to B&N and 15 to walk back, plus the grocery store...)

Since we already know that I'm neither chef nor cook, I wanted to make something easy that I had eaten before--again, thanks to Mom. I wanted to make portobellos with extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, basil and red peppers. Not hard, right? RRRRWrong!

I covered the mushrooms and red peppers in my tasty (ungodly simple) marinade put them on a foil covered cookie sheet, covered with foil (as I learned on about.com) and put it in for 30 on 425 degrees. ALL ACCORDING TO INSTRUCTIONS.

EXCEPT...I don't think I considered how easy it is for juices of any kind to travel away from their intended destination. At 18 minutes my apartment smelled divine. At 23 minutes, I sniffed three times and ran to the oven! The acrid smell of burning (and failure) was leaking from my mushrooms! I pulled those babies out, ripped off the top foil and found that my little, easy peasy marinade had shifted its way directly on the pan and off the foil. "Shhhii"-- I won't finish that.

It turns out that the mushrooms were delightful. I enjoyed them in silence while sitting on my blue futon hunched over like gargoyle. I had to stop myself from eating all three. Wait, did I mention I added feta and reduced fat basil & tomato feta to the mix? Cheese cures all that ills. Thank god!

After enjoying my tasty buds of fungus, I let myself recognize the nasty burnt smell and attended to the pan. The foil was stuck fast to the pan by oil. Not just stuck, fermetically sealed to it. I pulled, I ripped, I tried not to think about having to clean it off.

In the end, I did what any loving kitchen utility owner would do, I let it die. My cookie sheet went to its final resting place (the trash can and then the trash chute because it was still stinking up my apartment) at 7:03 p.m. on this beautiful August day. I'm sad to see it go, but I'm happy to say I don't have to clean it.

R.I.P. Gourmetware 15.25" x 10.25" x .63", Senior

Finding my way in the city and in some cooking

I was on my way to meet a wonderful, humorous, lovely friend of a wonderful, humorous, lovely friend back in Cincinnati. I intended to leave work in SoHo and take the C up to W 4th and V up to 23rd in midtown Manhattan. If only intentions could support my sense of direction.

Instead I went down into the subway station I have passed several times, not even looking up to see if it was going Uptown or Downtown. I had my directions tucked in my tiny purse in such a way so that I could glance at them without looking like I was the new kid. So clever.

So clever that I ended up in Brooklyn. Shocked (and mad at myself for not noticing that I took the wrong train just by the condition of trains in BK as compared to Manhattan) I got off at the very next stop all flustered and anxious. Oddly enough, a family of tourists asked me if the platform we were standing on would provide them with a train back into Manhattan. Of course it would, I said! Well, I should have followed them because I got on the WRONG DAMN TRAIN--AGAIN.

And so...I found myself further in Brooklyn all dressed up from work and feeling like an ass.

Finally, I made my way back up into Manhattan and to midtown. I ran once I got off the subway because I felt so very bad for making my new friend wait. (And by the new friend I mean we had never met, but because we had a mutual friend, she agreed to go on this friendship blind date. Bless her heart!)

Along with the rest of the female and gay community, we watched Julie & Julia. Front and center. Perfect seats. I won't mention the fact that I dropped my peanut M&Ms halfway through the movie, that Michelle stepped on a lady's bag of popcorn when she snuck out to pee or that we were the only two people in the theater laughing over Julia's idiosyncrasies. Actually, I am mentioning it because all those things made it a better friendship date for me!

Afterwards, I took the PATH home, which I have done many times now. Lo and behold, I got on the wrong PATH train and found myself closer to Newark than Hoboken. G.D.! I tried not get anxious and tense up my shoulders (too late) and I got home just fine.

Now, in the comfort of my quiet apartment with my unneccesarily large kitchen I looked around to see what I could make. Afterall, you can't watch two hours of french cooking without getting a hankering yourself. And what did I come up with? Rice. Rice in a box.

So that's what I'm having. Rice that I simmered myself and wine that only called for a quick uncorking. No Julia Child culinary skills here, but after three wrong trains and a long week, it's my very best culinary foot foward.

Foodie Fears

What is it about food that tempts us to relinquish control? To savor or to scarf. It lets you fall to pieces or it can put you back together again. It can be the stale meals of the every day life alone or it can be warm and heavy goodness of meal cooked where you called home. It's an addiction and a necessity all at once. No other sensory infused act can be described quite the same.

I have been thinking about food often. Partly because I'm usually alone when I eat now that I live away from my friends and family and partly because eating has become burdensome and complex. When you're alone all evening, or in some cases all day, you only have yourself to find entertain. After a while the TV is terrible, reading is too sedentary and going out again for a tedious task sounds ridiculous. Instead, you make food, eat snacks and serve yourself more than your regular portions of muffins or cookies or what have you. Why? To pass time. To stimulate you senses. To have somewhere to walk to. And to make you feel full so maybe you won't feel lonely.

Being lonely is a bit stigmatized as it seems to point to the bearer of loneliness a big sign that says OUTCAST. Loneliness comes in all forms, from left out to without friends. But admitting that you're lonely seems to say that you've been by yourself and rest assured, you are just as boring as you thought you would be. I don't say that with any sort of a sourness or sadness, but aren't we all bored with ourselves from time to time? Isn't it our interactions that give us our spark and our chance to shine? Our shared laughs become our private giggles at home and the smiles that pop on our face during the work day without reason. It's other people that make us luminous.

Even when are interactions with others are fitful, angry, anxious or irritable. It still ignites our senses and stirs our thoughts and emotions. No matter what, after speaking with someone there is always something to think about.

When you're at home alone you're left with yourself and your fizzly sparks. And trust me, they get really fizzly after a while. So you eat, you think about how you would like to be able to cook or rather you would like to be able to enjoy cooking and therefore cook. Instead, (and by YOU I mean I) I make "Just Add Water" muffins and chicken that I probably won't eat because I'm so god awful tired of chicken I could be happy with PB&J. (Which, by the way, I had tonight and it's not as satisfying with raspberry jam. Mistakes can be made even in old standbys.)

Tonight, I tried to make it different. I read instead of watching TV. Although, futons make for miserable reading couches and there really is no comfortable way to read when you spine is in a "C' shape. And guess what? No unnecessary jamming of food down my lonely old throat. Just a mediocre PB&Jam that got halfway eaten, a fiberone bar for chocolate, a bit of dark chocolate because a fiberone doesn't count and a whole lot of milk.

So far so good, fellow eaters. I'm just hoping I make it all the way to bed without eating a whole pot of rice and seventeen snack packs. I make no promises.