Cooking Can Be Fun

Cooking kind of scares me. It always has. I remember when I was a kid visiting my grandmother, she would use her hand as a measuring cup, adding a fistful of this or a pinch of that, without looking at a recipe. Who the heck can compete with that kind of pressure?

But I was recently invited to a dinner party at my friend Kermette's house. Not having much experience with dinner parties that don't involve BBQ and paper plates, I was a little concerned about my long forgotten table manners. I generally don't do well in situations with more than three forks and two plates. I was afraid I'd use the oyster fork incorrectly and be shamed into leaving the state.

There were ten of us ladies invited. We chatted amiably amongst ourselves while we waited for our hostess. Kermette came downstairs and brought a cup with numbers in it; we had to pick a number to divide us into teams. Each team was responsible for cooking a different 'course' of the evening meal--appetizer, salad, meat, etc. We all immediately kidded Kermette about her extravagant ruse to get us all to cook for her, but we were kind of intrigued. I could tell because several ladies immediately declared that they would need some sort of alcoholic beverage to get their courage up. We are a raucous bunch when it's just us girls.

My partner Patty and I got the job of making Ratatouille. After someone told us how to pronounce it, we got to work. the first order of business was chopping up zucchini, eggplant, and squash. I generally am not very good with knives, but I was extremely careful. Nothing like severing an artery to kill a party. We were momentarily distracted by the recipe calling for a 'dutch oven'. Huh? We ended up using a large pot instead. We were to saute' the first group of veggies while chopping up a second round, including three different peppers. I was in charge of mincing garlic. I have never minced garlic before. I gave it the old college try, in the spirit of the evening.

That was when Patty noticed that we had an extra yellow squash. Oops! Patty made quick work of cutting the squash up and slipping it into the pot with the peppers and the garlic. Then we added stewed tomatoes, wine, and various spices. While that cooked, I grated the parm cheese, the last part of the recipe. In the meantime, we snacked on the appetizer, a hot cheesy crab dip which was served with homemade artisan bread baked by our friend Dee. My sister-in-law and her partner got the task of cooking the Cornish game hens, while another group made a Caesar salad, and the last team worked on risotto.

Then it was dinner time! Kermette had her formal dining room set up fancy.



Cornish Game Hens



Ratatouille



Risotto



Dinner is Served!!!



It was a wonderful evening!