The Stir Fry Adventure of 2011 or How to make a big freakin' mess in the kitchen

Ok, let me start by stating the obvious. Some people were meant to cook. I am not one of them.

And what I mean is that some people have the gift of looking at random ingredients and saying with the confidence of Bobby Flay on Iron Chef, "Ok, I can whip together sauteed eel tails with ostrich sauce and a side of radish and pimento-stuffed eggplant." And whatever they make will taste good and their cooking will not kill anyone. Again, I am not one of those people.

Easy Mac! Oh boy oh boy oh boy!

It always cracked me up when I got invited to Pampered Chef parties. ME? You want me to attend your Pampered Chef party? Are you kidding? Do you know me? Have you ever seen me cook? If your party has the word "chef" in it, please don't invite me. That word scares me. (Unless it is followed by Boyardee.)

EASY MAC is more my speed. God bless the people at Kraft when they developed Easy Mac. It was made for people like me. A delicious Mac & Cheese meal in less than 4 minutes? No mixing, no measuring and no stove required? Hand me a fork! Nummy nummy!

Even better, POP TARTS were made for people like me -- the instructions are basically:
 

Dulce de Leche Pop Tarts?
AWESOME! (I believe it
means "straight to the hips"
in Italian.) If anyone out there
can find a box of these,
I'll be your new best friend. 

Open package
Remove Pop Tarts from wrapper
Put them in toaster
Toast them
Eat them
Enjoy and go on with your day

Ta-daaa! That's what I call COOKIN'!

Some people cook with reckless abandon. I cook with reckless abandon and a little bit of fear. And a fire extinguisher. When I bought my condo, I liked the saying, "I only have a kitchen because it came with the house." So true. I probably made popcorn more than anything else in that kitchen.


Ahhh, but I digress...

Holy crap! Look out! She's trying to
cook with the woka-woka-WOK!

So, we're staying in a new house. It's very nice here, but don't get me started on the surly housekeeper. (She sort of came with the house. Me no likey having a housekeeper.) This place also came with a WOK, which I like better than the surly housekeeper. (And every time I say that word, WOK, I have to fight the urge to get in touch with my inner Muppet Show geek and say, "Waka-waka-wakaaa!" like Fozzy Bear.) (I never claimed to be normal.)

So, back to the waka-waka-waka. I got inspired to try something new.

That's right. I was inspired... to cook.

I hope no one fainted just now.

This is NOT what mine looked like. This
was taken from the website of someone
who knew what they were doing.

So I cheerfully gathered my victims -- uh, I mean vegetables from the market. Onions. Broccoli. Red peppers. Carrots. Sugar snap peas. Garlic. And chicken. I thumbed through a cookbook simply called "THE WOK" and saw something about how much oil to add. I didn't have the sesame oil or peanut oil or whatever other oils they suggested for cooking. What did I have? Olive oil.

(A few days later, when I mentioned the Stir Fry Adventure of 2011 to my friend, Linda [one of those people who enjoys cooking] I told her I used olive oil and she laughed and said, "And olive oil has a much lower smoking point temperature than regular stir fry oils." Huh? Terms like "smoking point temperatures" are foreign to me. She may as well have been speaking in Swahili.)

Ok, so there I am with bowls of veggies around me, ready for the attack. Some people claim that their food sings and makes happy noises when they're cooking. Not mine. I threw the chicken into the oil and it made a hissing sound. I threw the veggies in on top to sort of cool everything off and it didn't work as well as I had hoped. (I mean it, the chicken sounded like that girl in "The Exorcist" movie.) And here's a note for all of you Stir Fry Virgins out there: there's a reason it's called STIR fry. You actually have to take a spatula and move things around or they'll stick to the side of the wok and you'll have to pry them off with a crowbar. Just a friendly little hint from your cooking buddy, Jen. And you know how you see professional chefs flip things around in the pan just by flicking their wrist? Well, don't try that. Ever. Woks are heavy. And if you're as coordinated as I am, attempting that trick will mean you'll be picking pieces of broccoli off your ceiling for days.


This is what it really looked like. Too bad I can't add
sound to this image. And smell. And a sense of fear.


Not only were my veggies and chicken bits hissing at me, the oil was making them pop around and they were trying to save themselves by jumping out of the wok. I had to keep pushing them back in as I stirred -- they were eager to jump overboard. A few made it out before I caught on to their plan.

Oh, and I forgot to mention the soy sauce. I had no idea how much to add, so I just popped open the bottle and dumped some in with a flair. Viola! I am a cooking goddess!

Everything turned brown.

Not a delightful yummy grilled-looking brown but a smooshy sloppy dirty sickly mushy yucky brown. Mmmmm! Brown sloppy stir fry! Dinner is served!

Served over a bed of rice, the whiteness of the rice almost made the colors look like something you'd find in nature. Or at least like something you'd want to eat. But no matter how it may have looked, I am happy to report that no one died as a result of my Stir Fry Adventure of 2011. But there are still leftovers...

Until we meet again, keep on cooking with reckless abandon and stay thirsty my friends!