The Cook In Me

I never thought I’d say this but sometimes and I mean SOMETIMES, I like to cook. I know of people who live to cook….like some people live to eat but to me, cooking is fine….it’s the preparation and the aftermath that I hate to high heaven.

I liken cooking to, say, chemistry. Yeah, a cook is like a chemist. You’re free to tryout and experiment with all those ingredients you have there in whatever way you want. In a certain way, the destinies of the people who actually eat the food that you make are in your hands as well. Tell me that statement doesn’t make you feel powerful.

Nowadays, I try to limit my time in the kitchen to cook because work (the one that earns me a living) is piling up but I suspect that when school starts up again, I would have to start donning that apron again. The thing is that sometimes whatever I cook is nice….much to my own delight and to the kids’ delight. However, when the wind blows me the wrong way….that one…er…everyone suffers-lah! And yet, for the number of hours that I have been toiling in the kitchen with frying oil landing on the open pores on my face, everybody better shut up and eat, I tell you! Otherwise, they’re going to get an earful from me about people dying from hunger in some far flung country in some obscure land in some unheard of planet!

Me and cooking….we have a love and hate relationship, I would say. Hang on a minute there, actually, come to think of it, I don’t hate cooking per se. I hate the preparation and the washing up and DIDN’T I ALREADY MENTION THAT ALREADY IN THE BEGINNING? What on earth….

Anyway, you know what I wish I had? A kakak (a maid/a housekeeper) who is with me all the time to cut up, prepare and wash everything up! But because I love my privacy and we don’t have room for kakak to stay in….sigh. I have my in-laws’ kakak over at my place on Sundays (which is like today) and I enjoy it completely because she’s everywhere attending to everything and I am, like, sitting there watching the television or playing with Facebook on my computer or playing with my piano and she just runs around doing everything for me! Splendorous!

If you’re asking if I can cook….it depends. Does the agak-agak (guessing) method count as cooking? If you dare, I invite (dare you to come for) to dinner one day lah. Whether you end up licking the dishes up or puking in the sink…..ah….no guarantees there, buddy!