Daft Pick

When I first met my husband, we were both graduate students at a venerable institution.  Our courtship had a slow start, hitting many obstacles along the way.  Among them was the fact that each of us was living on a shoestring, begging, borrowing and, well, let’s just leave it at borrowing, to get by the enormous tuition bills and the pricey New England cost of living.  A romantic Saturday night date often involved studying in the Medical Library and splitting a Snickers Bar. We would see movies on Sunday at noon because the movie theater ran a 99 cent special. To make ends meet, my husband moved from the dorm into a house he shared with four other medical students.  For my part, I offered myself up as a “Freshman proctor” in order to reap the benefits of a free dorm room and a meal plan in the Freshman Union.

I was very impressed at the fact that my husband cooked his own meals.  He managed to get by for about fifteen dollars per week, successful in sustaining himself on a passable mix of protein and carbohydrates.  He claimed that he “preferred” chicken wings to other cuts, that the generic O cereal was indistinguishable from the name brand, and that orange juice was quite superior when reconstituted from frozen, canned glop.  His diet resembled sports bar leftovers, yet I had to give him credit for managing three squares a day on a tight budget.

I, on the other hand, knew my way around a kitchen—even back in those days.  I loved to spend the day shopping for fresh ingredients and then laboring over a flavorful meal.  Frequently, I could be found on the cookbook aisle of bookstores, perusing the latest offerings while rolling each recipe around on my imaginary tongue.   I enjoyed cooking for my friends, taking great joy in preparing spaghetti dinners for the fencing team, or key lime pie for my dorm mates.

With this guy, however, I needed to be careful.  Things were getting serious; I could not cook for him until I was certain I wanted to keep him.  After he invited me to a “house dinner” with the guys where he prepared burritos, I decided to play a few cards from my culinary hand.  I invited him to dinner at my place, a fifteen-by-fifteen foot square dorm room equipped with a  two-burner hotplate, a toaster oven, and a 1.6 cubic foot refrigerator.

Dessert would be easy—classic key lime pie does not require baking if you purchase a ready-made graham cracker crust (although I now make it differently in order to avoid raw egg yolks).  I prefer making my own crust, but in a dorm room you have to make choices, avoiding the errant crumbs that attract little visitors.  

For dinner, I had to process two separate variables.  One was the budget:  I could splurge up to ten dollars for a special meal.  The other was logistics: I had a Teflon frying pan, a small saucepan and the baking rack of my toaster oven.  Thus, I chose to prepare a rounded meal of stuffed chicken breast, rice pilaf, and some steamed vegetables.  I purchased two chicken breasts on the bone and fileted them myself, saving a few cents per pound.  My other purchases included a $2.99 bottle of Soave Bolla, a small bag of rice, a head of broccoli, an onion, and a bulb of garlic. From the dining hall I “procured” several slices of white bread to make stuffing, many individually wrapped pats of butter, two bouillon cubes, salt and pepper shakers, and a handful of wrapped toothpicks, to secure the stuffed chicken breasts.  I set myself to work, patting myself on the back for my ingenuity.

The sun began to set and a light dusting of snow fell outside.  I set a table with dining hall china and flatware, and the two wine stems that followed me through college.   I lit a Yahrzeit candle for atmosphere, wondering how many safety codes I had already violated that day.  Right on time, my beloved arrived with a bunch of daisies, his mouth already watering from the caressing aromas that carried him up the three flights of stairs.  He poured the wine while I removed the toothpicks from the cooked chicken and arranged the meager portions on the plate, trying my best to make the meal appear as elegant as if served in a restaurant.  He looked at the plates and then into my eyes, appreciating the feast that lay before him.

He cut into the chicken and sighed with anticipation.  As he chewed, a look of confusion overtook his face.  I watched while he tried to maintain his love-drenched expression, doing his best to choke down my creation.  Something clearly was wrong with this meal.  Had the chicken gone bad?  It smelled fine while it was being prepared.  “What’s wrong?” I asked.  “Perhaps you should taste the chicken,” he said, non-judgmentally.  I cut into my serving, observing the succulence of the perfectly cooked meat.  It looked fine to me.  I put a piece in my mouth.  Thankfully, it wasn’t rancid.  The fact that I was not going to kill him with my cooking was a great relief.  But then, as I rolled it over in my mouth I began to detect something—wrong.  I quickly ran over the ingredients in my head: garlic, bread, butter, salt, pepper.  None of these could explain that off flavor.  What was it?  Tarragon, no.  Cinnamon, no.  Why, it was. . .MINT.  How did my labor of love become sprinkled with pockets of harsh mint?

Suddenly it hit me.  The purloined toothpicks had been individually wrapped.  It did not occur to me to taste them!  I fumbled around for one of the remaining packs and opened it.  Sure enough, I had poisoned my own creation with these mint oil-soaked toothpicks.  So much for the elegant dinner I had planned.  Graciously, he suggested we try eating around the mint, but I had skewered it with so many toothpicks to maintain the rolled shape of the chicken breasts there was no missing it.

I was mortified, barely able to show my face.  In that moment I saw the end of the relationship.  This would be the glance behind the curtain that would change everything.   Not today, but eventually, this stunt would reverberate until all he could see was the screw up that I am.  Tonight would become dating folklore; he would tell all subsequent girlfriends about the crazy girl who poisoned a perfect meal with minted toothpicks. 

Miraculously, however, we made it through the meal.  He loved the pie. 


Tomorrow's blog:  The Audition