The other day a friend of mine was perusing my blog, and she stopped for a minute.  I know she stopped because I was obsessively watching her eyes actually move across the page and hoping that she would, you know, chortle a bit (she was eerily silent).  There was not one smidgeon of chortling, but she’s, well, she’s just that way.

Anyhow, I digress.

At one point she stopped and, kind of muttered, “No…”

I tried to be all casual: “Whatttt??  WHAT is it? DID YOU LIKE IT? SOMETHING FUNNY?  Or wait, bad?? Something bad?  PLEASSSE JUST TELL MEEEE.”

Yep.  Cool as a mint julip, my friends.

She simply nodded at the screen and said, “It’s wrong.  You said you’re a lousy cook.  That’s wrong.  You are a great cook.  You need to go back and change that.”

My friend is simply divine.  She is, well, she’s the butter on my bread.

My homemade bread, ya’ll.  I KNOW.  I make bread, bout twice a week.   Hot and crusty with just a hint of sweet, real butter all oozy and sliding around…  I would go on but this is not Showtime and I don’t want to upset my pastor’s wife, who reads this once in a while.

Here are some of my greatest hits in the kitchen (cue Slow Jam music):

1.  Chicken and dumplings.  Oh yeeaah.  Whole chicken is a must.   (I scoff at you, you skinless chicken breasts! We have no place for naked breasts at our home!)

(Wow. That was kinda pushing it.)

2.  Pulled pork and gravy with mashed potatoes.  A subtle hint of cayenne is the secret.  It does, however,  resemble Alpo.  Close your eyes and hoover it.

3.  Double chocolate brownie/sheet cake thing.  Haven’t made this in ages but really, it’s a pan ‘o love, I tell you.  Snuggle up with it and a good book at night and, well, it completes you.

4.  Shepherd’s Pie.  You know, Jesus was called the Good Shepherd.  This meal would be right up his alley, I believe.

5.  Biscuits and gravy with LARD ya’ll.  BOOM. I AIN’T PLAYIN’.

6.  Stromboli.  It’s the yummoli.

7.  Sour cream and raisin pie.  Frozen pie crust, you ask?  Pfft.  As if.  This recipe is as old school as an episode of Andy Griffith, and my dad loves it.  He’s waaaaay old school.  In fact, there was no school for him; they hadn’t invented it yet.

8.  Some weird version of chicken soup with lemon and ginger and hot peppers and cilantro.  I feed it to the hubs whenever he starts sniffling, and I swear some times he fakes the snot so he can get some.

9.  The best BLT this side of anywhere they sell bacon.  I MEAN lo, it is just a BLT but mine stands for Baby, Leave me Ta heck alone while I eat it…

10.  I need a round number so, I’ll just say it.  My peanut butter balls, ya’ll.  They might not be pretty, but they are chocolatey balls of goodness.  I make ’em for the hubs birthdays and anniversaries and any other sort of celebration.  Because, you know.  You can never have too many balls.

Ok.  I am a good cook.

And now, see exhibit BLONDE here on the left?  See this sweet little cherub of goodness right der?  Well, he is a dirty little rat that turns up his twitchy little rat nose at everything I present to him.  (I KNOW…  rats aren’t really known for being picky, but you get what I mean.)

Oh, the Redhead eats everything not nailed down.  It’s wonderful.  However, he better get a trade fast because he is creating a budget deficit in our house  that is rather epic.  (See previous post on Economics.)

This is how the darling Blonde responds to:

1.  Homemade chicken and noodles:

Blonde one covers his mouth as if I have just placed a bowl of buzzard guts in front of him.  Even just a whiff of the chickeney goodness, I guess, sends him gagging.  He then proceeds to lay his forehead on the table in abject despair.  All is lost.  Chicken. And. Noodles.  MY GOD WOMAN!  HOW COULD YOU?   CHICKEN AND NOODLES?  I CAN’T GO ON.  REALLY.  DIS IS DA END.

2.  Stromboli:

“I don’t care for dis.  It tastes… dusty.”

I’ll show you dusty, my little blonde friend.  The hubs had to intervene on that one because blonde one was about to get an education on dust (da FLOOR.)

3.  Shepherd’s Pie

Blonde one:  “It tastes like… butter.”  His mouth is screwed on because evidently butter is the devil’s condiment.  Blonde one and Jesus are good friends, I promise you, but we have a ways to go.

4.  The balls.  No problem.  Gone.  When he’s done he looks like he has a chocolate goatee.  It’s whimsical.

What he will eat, with abandon:  hot dogs.  Of course.

So… if he had his way he would eat just hot dogs and my peanut butter balls forever, and life would be dandy.  And you can just go right ahead and insert your OWN joke here because I AM NOT GOING THERE.  I am far too mature for that kinda cheekiness, my friends.

<< chortle >>

*  My lawyers tell me I need to insert a disclaimer here, so read this really really fast:

It’s just a teensy weensy bit possible an itsy bitsy bit of creative license was taken here.  I’m not sure, but maybe.

Has anybody out there had a picky eater???  And what DOES “dusty” food taste like?