I am not the greatest cook.
I can work the microwave like nobody’s business, but when it comes to cooking basics, I used to not be able to do much past heat up the stove.
My husband, on the other hand, is a wonderful cook. He’s one of those that can take a pinch of this and a dash of that and come up with an awesome tasting meal. Sometimes I find meals from Facebook and he figures out how to cook them.
But at the beginning of our relationship, he assumed I knew the basics of cooking. Once, he asked me to make hashbrowns for breakfast while he jumped in the shower. I said I didn’t know if I could do that. He replied no one can screw up hashbrowns.
So, I turned on the stove, pulled out the enormous cube of hashbrowns from the freezer, and plopped it into a pan on the stove.
I waited.
And waited.
After a while (it could have only been a few minutes—I’m not necessarily the most patient person), I got frustrated with this block of frozen hashbrowns and turned up the stove.
The stove caught on fire.
I yell, turn off the stove, and it is still on fire. My husband hears me yelling, runs into the kitchen, puts out the fire, and looks at me in disbelief. “You heat it up first in the microwave to thaw it, not put the frozen rock in the pan,” he said.
“You didn’t tell me that part.”
“I thought you knew that—everyone knows that.”
He ended up cooking the hashbrowns that morning.
Moral of the story: stick with your strengths. It’s okay to have other people can help out where you are weak. And thaw frozen blocks of food before sticking it on the stove.