The Angst of Cooking

Cooking is a skill set I never mastered and sorely miss now. The daily responsibility of planning dinner with unfamiliar foods then teaching myself how to prepare it almost makes me want to get a job. Working provides the perfect alibi for not cooking yourself, while simultaneously supplying the funds to pay someone else to cook for you, whether that’s the grocery employees who rotisserie your chicken, the restaurant chefs who prepare your take-out, or the thoughtful folks in the frozen-food industry.

Japanese grocery stores do sell a variety of pre-cooked foods. I never know exactly what I’m getting, but they’re convenient when you’re coming home late on the subway (after spending half a day on a simple task like filling a prescription) and really don’t want to cook. On those nights, dinner conversation at our house tends to run something like this:

“I think it’s either chicken or pork.”
“I don’t know. Tastes kind of – different.”
“Well, it’s pretty good.”
“I prefer this.”
“What is it?” “Beef, maybe?”
“It’s cold and kind of chewy. Is that normal? Maybe we’re supposed to cook it first…”

On one such evening, I searched the pre-cooked food shelves for things that looked like chicken, which generally stand the greatest chance of being accepted by the boys. I spied one package containing short skewers with two breading-covered balls on each. I’ve had balls of chicken before that looked like that, so I put a few packages in my basket. Feeling like I was finally starting to get the hang of things, I headed for home.

Our 13-year-old was the first to try a chicken ball, which is unusual because historically he has been a very picky eater. Of course for him, trying it meant nibbling off a tiny section of the breading. The hole he made revealed the curve of something whitish, shiny and round. Weird looking chicken. He handed it to me with a look that said, “Last time I trust you.” I took a brave bite to set a good example and tasted egg. Quail egg I guessed, because of the small size. It was actually pretty good. I’d say, “live and learn,” but I have little hope of finding breaded quail eggs again now that I know I like them. Next time I buy round things skewered on sticks it will probably turn out to be liver.

Once a week we treat ourselves to Dominos pizza, which is actually better here than in the states. We stick with standards, like cheese and sausage, but the Japanese think that’s strange. They prefer pizzas like these from the Dominos menu:

Lasagna Pizza – potato (when did they start putting potato in lasagna?), parmesan cheese and parsley
Mayo Jaga – potato, “fresh” bacon, corn, pimento, onion and mayonnaise (whitish horizontal and vertical lines crisscross the whole pizza, creating an interesting checkerboard effect)
Giga Meat – pepperoni, “fresh” bacon, pork sausage, and… bacon (not so fresh?)

So next time you fill your cart with foods you can identify and load them into your trunk to drive home, think of me playing guessing games, riding my fully loaded double-basket bike uphill home, and scouring The Joy of Cooking to find out what to do with octopus.