On becoming domestic

EMC Editorial - If you've followed my writings for some time, you're probably aware of my incompetence in the kitchen.

Other than select varieties of cookies, cakes and pies, I've historically shied away from having to prepare anything more complicated than green smoothies or bagels with peanut butter and jam. On the few occasions that I have made supper for my family, it's almost always been some sort of breakfast-for-dinner type meal like pancakes, French toast or tofu scramble.

The mere thought of preparing things like vegetables, rice and potatoes stresses me out. Why, you ask? I guess the short answer is that I've simply never figured out basic rules like how long I need to cook things for and at what temperature. A few missteps which yielded unappetizing results like soggy, over-steamed zucchini and pots ruined by grains of reeking, burnt rice stuck to the bottom left me with a discouraged opinion of my abilities.

Thankfully, this has never been a problem because my husband adores cooking, and is extremely amenable to my desire to eat a mostly plant-based diet. The best part is that he's actually quite a good cook, and although I may on occasion be overheard complaining about his habit of using every single pot and pan we own to prepare one meal, or the way he piles all the vegetable scraps and peelings in the sink instead of the compost bin, I am nothing if not grateful for his efforts because I know I am the healthier for them.

If there is anything I find more daunting than having to prepare a proper meal, however, it's the long stretch of maternity leave I have coming up, and it is that which has inspired me to at last make a concerted effort to learn how to cook. I have never in my life not had school or a job to occupy my time for more than a couple of months, and during those stretches I was always at least looking for work - which is a full-time job in itself, to say the least.

I'm not trying to say that being a stay-at-home mom is not a full-time job - because I know that it is - it's just that I worry I will not "be the right fit" for this job because domestic tasks have never been my forte. (I am ashamed to say that my cooking failures are only the tip of the iceberg in this department.)

Now that I finally have a job I actually enjoy, having to simply walk away from it for six months makes the whole situation even more difficult to bear than it ever would have been in the past. What will I do all day if I can't be out in the community interviewing the good people of Kingston and Frontenac County and writing stories about local happenings? I fear the headline will read "fails miserably on the domestic front".

What I'm attempting to get at, in a very round-about way, is that I have made it my personal goal to try and cook at least two dinners per week until April, when my leave will start, at which point I hope to bring it up to four or five. Last week, I managed to throw together a half-decent stir-fry, which was quite encouraging. All the same, I know that some failures will be inevitable, and want to be able to push on in spite of them.

I hope that this goal will not only allow me to develop some much-needed domestic skills, but also present me with a somewhat enjoyable challenge to master while on leave. (Well, other than that whole caring for a newborn baby by myself thing - which terrifies me too much to even think about just yet.)

I suppose I'm telling you all this because nothing motivates me like feeling monitored. So please feel free to ask/text/tweet/Facebook me about how the cooking's going. The prospect that someone might bring it up will hopefully be enough to get me dicing up a carrot or two on a regular basis.

hpratt-campbell@theheritageemc.ca