Two Stories; One Kitchen

As newlyweds it seems strange to say that we don't have a long list of things in common.  Alas, that's more true than I'd often like to admit.  We've known each other since we were 12 and 13 and have been together for almost as long.  We've grown up together, but have still managed to not grow alike.  Jake just graduated with a BS in Physics and I have a BSE in Secondary Education English and never the twain shall meet.  He likes math, I like grammar; he likes science fiction, I like romance novels; he likes classic rock and I like pop music.  It seems like an unlikely match, but we seem to balance each other out...especially when we're cooking.

We love food.  As college students we lived apart.  During the week both of us ate whatever crappy college food was around (ramen noodles, pop tarts, frozen pizza...you get the idea).  On the weekends we cooked together.  We used recipes we found on tv, the internet, in cookbooks, or, when our friends realized that we were pretty gifted in the kitchen, recipes given to us by Jake's roommate.  We could follow a recipe all day long and it always turned out well.

Living together has brought different challenges.  I'm working a retail job till the end of the summer so I spend sometime almost everyday at work.  We try to cook one good meal each day that we eat together.  When I'm working the closing shift that usually means lunch (or really late dinner after I get home).  If I pick up a day shift or on the rare occasions when I don't have to work, we make dinner.  Any way you slice it, we eat together a meal we've created as a couple each day.

We try to plan our meals.  When we go grocery shopping we get the ingredients for the meals that we cook and like the most.  However, we have the tendency to come up with some crazy food ideas from time to time.  Some of these have to be improvised because we don't have all of the ingredients we need.  Other times the food doesn't work the way we want it to so we end up changing it on the fly.  We've had some close calls with the smoke detector, but everyone still has ten fingers....I think.

Tonight was one such occasion.  I got home from work a bit after 10 and was hungry because, like usual, I had forgotten to take something along with me for dinner.  It's closing in on grocery day so we don't have much in the house for food.  I always keep a stockpile of noodles and sauce though.  I told Jake that I was going to make myself noodles and sauce and asked if he wanted any.  Instead of answering me, he walked over into the kitchen and started rummaging around in the fridge to see what kind of sauce we had.  "What if we make a sauce," he says to me, "We can use the sauce we have as a base and make a roux...wait, do you have flour?"  I love to bake.  I bake cookies, breads, cakes, pies, brownies, anything.  Most of these items require flour...so of course I have flour in my apartment.

"Yes Jake, of course I have flour.  I bake, remember?"  I reply, more sarcastically than not (which is my style).

"Perfect.  We need butter and flour to make a roux and then we can throw in some wine and cream cheese and maybe some of the sauce we already have and...what do we have for spices?"

All of this is happening while he's whipping through the cabinets and fridge and taking things out, putting them back in, and scouring the kitchen for possible sauce ingredients.

"We don't have any milk," he announces to me, "It'll be okay.  We'll just wing it.  Wanna make a sauce?"

"Let's do it," I reply, "These sorts of things tend to turn out well for us.  We'll just go for it and see what happens."  As he starts with his melted butter and flour I realize it's really thick.  Despite my best efforts (that included wine, melted cream cheese, and alfredo sauce) it was still just too thick.

"We really do need milk, don't we?"  I ask, knowing that this will involve one of us taking the trip down to the corner gas station to get the required ingredients (this happens often).

"Yeah.  Milk would be a good idea."  Off I go on the quest for milk.  I return with milk...and two sodas (of course!  I have a small...okay not so small...addiction to soda).  The milk definitely does the trick, but I had put so much wine into the sauce to try to thin it out that it was all you could taste.  Jake proceeded to add pepper, red pepper flakes, and coriander.  Mix well and taste.  Still too much wine.  More coriander?  Yes please.  Mix again.  Taste again.  Much better.  Wait, it's actually really good.

"Jake!  This is delicious!" I exclaim.

"Yeah?" he asks before he tasting the delicious sauce.  I nod my head, unable to find words to tell him how good it really is.  He sticks his finger in the sauce, licks, and starts to nod his head as his eyebrows raise in shocked delight.  "It is pretty good, isn't it," he says with a smile on his face.

We realized quickly that with all the adding of the liquid to the roux we made a lot more sauce than we anticipated.  "Ummm...this really is a lot of sauce," I admit, knowing that it was my random adding of liquids that created such an abundance of sauce.

"That's fine," Jake replied, completely unmoved by the clear excess, "We'll just combine the two jars of sauces in the fridge, rinse out the empty one and put our sauce in there.  We'll have our own jar of leftover homemade sauce!"

Jake is always wanting to brag to our friends and family about how awesome our makeshift meals turn out, and this one was no different.  Almost immediately after we finished eating he was cozying up to me on the couch asking me who I was going to tell about this fabulous creating.  "I don't know," I replied, "Probably my mom, Granny (my grandmother), and Taylor (my sister).  But I'm not going to tell them now.  It's almost midnight!"

"We should start a blog with all of our kitchen adventures and all of the good food we end up making.  We can tell the stories, share pictures, and brag about our good food!" Jake declares.

So, here we are, blogging about our food adventures, kitchen mishaps, and mutual love for food and each other.

I feel like that's all I've got for now.  I'm storied out...not to mention that it's 12:30 am and I'm starting to spell things wrong more often than not.  Until the next adventure!

-Kayla