One of our long standing jokes in our home comes from the hilarious blogs/pics of failed Pinterest projects and recipes in which there's an amazing pic of a yummy dinner or a super crafty project and next to it is someone's pitiful attempt to achieve the same result, with the title under it that says "nailed it"! Well, I have had more "nailed its!" in the kitchen than I would like to publicly admit. Like this gem that is pictured above of my petty attempt at Amish friendship bread. Yikes! I totally blame it on my pans. My 2 zillion dollar bread pans that I bought from the Pampered Chef back in 2002 when I thought I was gonna be cooking wifey of the year! Nailed it! Ha. Not. Fast forward to 2015 and the struggle is still so real that I can taste it...or not, because it ain't edible. Have any of you ever been involved in the planning of a party with me? If so, you might note that my involvement isn't typically of the food kind. I promise, like really, really promise, that it's not because I am lazy, or because I'm trying to shirk responsibility. It's because I'm trying to save face - cause there's a 90% chance that I'm gonna jack it up. Had a baby in the last decade? Chances are, I didn't bring you a meal. Not because I don't love you, and I promise that I've felt total guilt about it, but it's because I have kitchen performance issues that I can't get over. If you have had a baby and I stepped out, I probably had so much anxiety that I brought you Rosie's or Steak Out, or, sigh, I even ordered a pizza for a friend's family and had it delivered. I have even have one friend say 'naw, I'm good, you don't have to cook me anything'. That totally translates to, it's okay, honey, you are such a pitiful cook that we would rather eat leftovers. I suck, okay. Somehow. I am the queen of (a) I can't decide what to make so I procrastinate and make it hard on myself (b) oops, I forgot to buy fill-in-the-blank of one minor ingredient that I forgot that makes or breaks the recipe (c) I ran out of time (d) I'm gonna make the toughest recipe that ever existed, despite the fact that it's not my strong point. So...it either blows, doesn't happen and I end up bringing some cookies from Publix that I picked up on the way to the shindig, or my poor husband (who is a much, much better cook than I - and I hope that didn't revoke his man card because it's HOT!) ends up fixing it for me. It's really much better off if I just sign up to bring plates - I'm really good at coordinating colors, or sweet tea (I'm totally gonna bring Milo's), or just donate some $ to the cake. Probably my most epic public humiliation came from a shower at work in which I (sigh) cut up Swiss cake rolls and swirled them around a platter and called them chocolate pinwheels. I hear you. You're laughing out loud. It's okay. In my defense, I was 250 weeks pregnant and I probably ate a quarter of the Swiss cake rolls before they made it to the platter, and it's the thought that counts. I wanted to contribute and do my part because I love my friends and wanted to celebrate. And, you can't laugh any harder than my co-workers did, and still do to this day about this amazing display of patheticness. It was slightly ingenious, really. Nailed it!! Somewhere, my awesome cook of a Mom is reading this and shaking her head in shame at the cooking failure that I've become.
But, 2015 is my year, y'all! Resolution number two is to not be a "nailed it!" statistic. I'm going to step out of my box and not only sign up for plates, napkins, and milo's tea. I'm gonna cook a couple of things! I can't pick hard stuff. It's gotta be easy stuff. I think if I can get some confidence behind me that maybe I can build up and get a little better. I need to get a few tried and true recipes that I don't jack up merely because I walked in the kitchen. I get that I'm not gonna be Martha Stewart or Julia Child, but it's okay. I don't even know what half of their ingredients are anyway, and if I have to go to Timbuktu to get an ingredient, well, it ain't happening. It's my year, y'all! I'm gonna cook a little something for a work shower this week. I know it won't rival the Swiss cake rolls, but maybe it will do :)
I've already redeemed myself this year one time...y'all ready for the reveal?!?
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