Cooking

[Wyatt Earp]

So, who round here cooks? I've lost track.

WOM reckons Canadian men generally don't; do other OTF Canucks agree? Tubby Isaacs I think is broadly a non-cooker. Purves Grundy I know does most of the cooking in their house. Round ours, it's about 50-50, with her indoors, who's a pro, rather more likely to cook when people come round; maybe 70-30. I don't really bake or do puddings, that's my Achilles heel.

[Gangster Octopus]

Cooking

Usually it's me. Even in the olden days when I was working...

[Heliotrope]

Cooking

As we speak, I'm having a bowl of homemade vegetable-bean soup. I wouldn't say I'm a great cook, but I think I may be a bit hamstrung by cooking for one most of the time. Anyhow, specialties: soups, muffins.

[Andy C]

Cooking

I try to do my share in our hourse, but owing to an asymmetry in habitual getting-home-from-work times I do rather less than fifty percent of the cooking. I'm not bad at it, but my wife's cooking eclipses mine. I'm better at omelettes than she is, though, and I get rather conceited about my Cornish pasties.

[Hofzinser]

Cooking

I cook, and it's not far off a 50-50 split in our house. I certainly wouldn't claim to be an expert - I'm very, very far from that, in fact - but I'm pretty good at cooking stuff that involves chucking ingredients in a pot - eg chilli, bolgnaise, pasta sauces, curries, stir fries etc.

The missus does amazing roasts, and most of the thigns that I can cook. And she's also a bit of a genius at improvising. If we're left with some random ingredients in the fridge she always manages to come up with something really lovely to do with them.

One of my greatest pleasures in life is to be in the kitchen cooking on a Saturday night with a cold beer and some good music.

[Incandenza]

Cooking

I cook about once or twice a week. I have a few staples that I rely on and can make well--some Indian-ish potatoes with tomatoes and cilantro added on top, spaghetti carbonara, fish with green beans, and enchiladas.

[Incandenza]

Cooking

Oh yeah, breakfast: omelettes, frittatas, plain ol' scrambled eggs with some potatoes, bell peppers, and sausage...all that I'm really good at. Also chilaquiles, which seems to have been discovered by a lot of non-Mexican restaurants here.

[hobbes]

Cooking

I cook. Not terribly well, but I can wack together a 3 course christmas roast for 12 if need be, or rustle up something edible. Not so good at presentation, perhaps, but I get by. And I do the majority of the cooking as I'm nearly always in before P and I'm used to cooking for myself. (She can actually cook but almost never bothered when she lived alone and doesn't often bother now.)
Cooking is much less fun since I quit smoking though. I used to like to sit at the kitchen table, drinking wine and smoking between stirs of the pot etc. Now it's just a bit boring.

[WOM]

Cooking

I've been trying to do more. I think I'm hangstrung a bit by not doing the shopping, so I've no idea what's lying around to work with. Plus, she's home at 4:15 and I'm home at 6, so mine are either 'cook ahead' meals or on the weekend.

[Bruno]

Cooking

I'll cook when cornered.

[Brandenburger Toro]

Cooking

I do all the cooking in my house.

[WOM]

Cooking

I'll cook when cornered.

Like a rat. But not that rat in Ratatouille.

[Bill Poster]

Cooking

Yeah I cook - I used to do it all but getting home increasingly later meant that my wife has taken to doing some of it. She's good at cooking but doesn't enjoy it at all.

I do enjoy it. To make up for lack of time during the week I will often make soups, sauces and stews at the weekends to use during the week.

My latest 'thing' is making my own bread. Not difficult just time consuming (in terms of time elapsed from start to finish anyway).

And I'd second what others have said about cooking for one. The missus is away on a course this week and after I'd used up all my stew, I ended up having crumpets and cheese for tea last night. I just couldn't be arsed cooking. Plus I blame the subliminal effect of the OTF thread.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Cooking

WOM reckons Canadian men generally don't; do other OTF Canucks agree?

No. I do 99% of the cooking around here. Of course as an ex-pat I may not fit WOM's purist vision of a Canadian male.

[WOM]

Cooking

Hah...purist vision of a Canadian male.

[E10 Rifle]

Cooking

I'd broadly count myself in the cooking camp, though I don't branch out as much as I should. I always feel a great sense of accomplishment when I've done something nice, especially for other people.

I got Fearners-Whitters's fish book for Christmas, though, which was pretty much my fave present (thanks Disco Sea Shanties) and am trying out as much new stuff as my innate laziness permits me.

And yeah, as Hof said, cooking with beer/wine at your side while blasting out tunes is indeed one of life's little pleasures

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Cooking

I love cooking. And I'm quite good at it. It's been months since anyone has suffered chronic stomach problems since eating any of my creations.

I can even do the thing where you pile the meat up on top of a little pile of potatoes and veg, like the Michelin Star chefs do.

I have a morbid fear of the dredge of washing-up, though. And as all of my best dishes require at least four pans just to produce something as simple as slices of roast lamb laid on top of a potato and parsnip mash with minted peas to one side and an apple jus laid over the top, I rarely bother.

So generally, while it's just me and my girlfriend slobbing around the house waiting for Eastenders to come on after the One Show, I really can't be bothered, frankly. Oven-ready "Thai-coated" chicken breasts from the freezer and chips, tonight. With spaghetti hoops.

[Guest]

Cooking

Back at home I used to do all the cooking. I quite like cooking. Now I live with 2 blokes, an English man who doesn't cook and a Canadian man who quite likes to but doesn't really know a lot about it. I keep cooking stuff and they keep eating it, which is quite nice esp as I only cook vegetarian. I don't see the point of cooking if it's just me, I never bother.

[ad hoc]

Cooking

Mostly me. But the kids are fussy bastards which kind of makes the whole thing less effective and pleasurable than it ought to be.

[Kurt Bafokeng]

Cooking

Count me in. My wife hates cooking.

[Reed John]

Cooking

As a loner, I don't have the patience to cook. I heat things and sometimes put things in the toaster oven, but when I'm hungry I just want to eat, not fuss around with it.

Besides, I like simple things with few ingredients. Like if I feel like some vegetables, I'll just steam some broccoli. And then if I want some bread, I'll just eat bread. If I want cheese, a hunk of cheese and a knife is all I need.

[Bruno]

Cooking

When I was single virtually my entire disposable income went into eating out, lunch and dinner. I lived on the north side of Chicago, so this was very doable. You could get pretty much anything you wanted, affordably (if you didn't have many other financial obligations).

[Reed John]

Cooking

That sounds appealing, but you must have weighed 700 lbs!! I know I would if I ate out in Chicago every night.

[Alderman Barnes]

Cooking

I'd say I do about 70% of the hot meals in our house. My missus is a better cook than me, but I don't think she gets any pleasure out of it. She's a functional cook. She can make something simple and really tasty in twenty minutes flat with one pot and one pan. When I cook, I need at least two hours and half the equipment and ingredients in the kitchen, and preferably some music and a nice drink while I'm doing it. I always try to make sure the kitchen's tidy when I'm finished, but she's got a nasty habit of coming into the kitchen at the precise moment when I'm just about to start cleaning up and it still looks like a bomb site.

So, relatively simple hot meals in midweek = her, Sunday roasts and fancy stuff = me. Fish and chips = both, that works really well, for some reason.

[Tactical Genius]

Cooking

I do all the cooking in my house.
For some reason, most of the women i meet are not good cooks or hate cooking. Personally i love cooking and hate washing up.

Chicken and ribs, with rice, fried plantain and roasted corn on the cob.
Ahhhh, the meal of champions.