Ready Steady (Reluctantly) Cook

Anyone who knows me will tell you I’m no Nigella.  I have phases where cooking from scratch seems a brilliant idea, and I embrace the kitchen like a long-lost relative from the Arctic Circle who is visiting for a week.  Seven days is usually the average for how long this odd behaviour lasts.  I’ve even been known to rush out and buy the odd new pot or utensil in a fit of out-of-character enthusiasm.  The last purchase was a vegetable peeler.  Those last two words currently leave me cold.  But at the time I was fired up by eating more vegetables than Bugs Bunny and rushed into Lakeland like a kid that had been let loose in a toy shop.  I came out with a ceramic implement that looked like it might also do a very good job at shaving my legs.  Needless to say, once home, the peeler remained in its packaging and was put away in a drawer full of other mainly redundant utensils, from flashy chopping knives to … well, weird looking objects, the purpose of which now fails me.
          However, at the beginning of January, the cooking issue reared its head again when I decided to have another crack at losing weight and was instantly attracted to websites that pledged you could stuff your face while the inches on your waistline melted away faster than a snowball in a microwave.  Enthused, I flipped through pages of mouth-watering recipes, all the while thinking, ‘Yesss, I’m up for this, get me into the kitchen NOW!’
          In the first week I lost three pounds.  In the second week my son gave me chocolate from Belgium which was devoured in sixty seconds and the weight went back on again.  In the third week I once again lost three pounds.  Please God that I stick to the website recipes and lose another three pounds in the fourth week.  Or a pound.  Even an ounce.  I’ll settle for that.
          On Friday night I cooked barbecue pulled pork with so much steamed veg I currently can’t look a bunch of broccoli in the eye.  The kitchen, which usually smells of fresh air and dog, wafted a tantalising aroma that had everybody’s taste buds tingling.  My daughter came home from drama school for the weekend, and nearly fainted with pleasure when she sat down at the table.
          ‘This is the nicest dinner you have ever cooked, Mum,’ said Eleanor.  ‘Did you really do this yourself, or did you nip out to the local pub and steal some of their cooking to pass off as your own?’
          I have been known, in an emergency, to do just that.
          ‘I really did cook this,’ I said, beaming away, enjoying the praise.  After all, it doesn’t happen very often.  In fact, I don’t think it’s ever happened.  Which reminds me.
          Little Johnny’s pre-school class went on a field trip to the fire station.  The firefighter giving the presentation held up a smoke detector.  He asked the class, ‘Does anyone know what this is?’  Little Johnny’s hand shot up.  ‘Yes, it’s what my mummy uses to let her know when dinner is ready…’