Aretha Franklin was once interviewed about her biggest challenges. She replied, “The biggest challenge is, for me, figuring out what to cook for dinner. Nightly, you know, just night after night.”
R.E.S.P.E.C.T Aretha. I feel that.
I am a sufficient home cook. I might be on the edge of being considered a good home cook. I’m a well above-average baker, but we can’t subsist on cookies and cinnamon rolls alone, which is disappointing for so many reasons.
In my twenties, I had such ambition around cooking delicious meals. I watched Martha Stewart. I did recipe swaps with friends. I bought cookbooks and made notes in margins. I wrote dates and drew tiny stars in blue ink next to things that went well. Wrote “NEVER AGAIN” next to things that were a disaster. I bought large bags of on-sale chicken breasts and cooked chicken in every way conceivable. My husband wasn’t (isn’t) a great litmus test for good versus bad results because he will literally eat anything. Only once in twenty-nine years of marriage has he said (to my inquiring how he liked something), “Hmm, I don’t know that I’d make that one again” while dishing up a second helping. Once. But, there has been a direct correlation between my greatly improved cooking abilities and a great decrease in my enthusiasm. Because my family keeps changing and, the thrill of deciding what to make has long been extinguished.
Currently, one person who lives here is trying to eat clean and eat healthier. Another is trying to rapidly put on muscle mass. This requires many meals per day and occasionally cooking beef at 10:00am, which is not my favorite. Yet another must eat gluten-free and won’t touch any fruit outside of apples, pears, and watermelon. Finding things to make that ring all these bells is like solving a riddle, and I can’t crack the code.
When my kids were young, I was plagued with following a different set of rules. There were so many rules. Introduce foods in a certain order. Don’t offer high-allergy foods. Do offer high-allergy foods. Fail. Had a kid allergic to three main foods eaten by toddlers worldwide. Experts said offer foods fifteen to twenty exposures to expand their palate. That was a lie. I had no idea the sight of zucchini 500 times could actually make my kid cry. It still makes him panic, and he’s sixteen years old now. What is for dinner? Not zucchini.
One summer, my husband and I were in line at a food stall at the farmers market in San Francisco. There was a tiny boy in front of us who ordered pasta with squid ink. I smiled at his perfect parents and hoped my face didn’t betray the fact that my own kids demanded cheese crackers in fish shapes over bunny shapes and wanted their apples cut “skinny, not big,” and two only ate cooked carrots while one only ate them raw. Perhaps I created these picky people, or maybe they are just wired like that? Also - where could I purchase squid ink in Minnesota?
A friend of my youngest son is a frequent visitor to our house. When I ask what he would like of available options, he always replies, “I’m eating whatever you’re making, Mrs. Fortner.” THIS is the kind of customer I appreciate. He is welcome here, always and forever. Because it is hard work to think of and then create thousands and thousands and thousands of meals.
And just as I felt like giving up and buying 500 frozen dinners, I overheard my son sit down to dinner the other night and sigh and say, “It’s so nice to have food made for you.” It really is. And it energizes me to focus on the more important element of what is for dinner. It’s not important what it is as long as there is dinner and we have it together.
Jen Fortner is a freelance writer who enjoys asking friends and strangers far too many questions. She spends her spare time sitting in inclement weather watching youth sports, traveling, cooking, and searching for the very best baked goods. She lives in Shorewood with her husband, three children and the most spoiled dog.