I've always liked to cook. When I was 8, I tried to cook a hot dog. I was alone in the house, and I was hungry. I thought to myself, "What do I need to cook? Well, I need something to cook on." I remember watching my mother cook, you see, although I couldn't remember just what she cooked on. So I grabbed a plate and a dog and slapped 'em on the stove. A few minutes later, the plate cracked. I was scared, so I thought to myself, "Well, I don't want to damage the plate any more, and I certainly don't want to hurt the stove, so I'd better get that plate off of there." So I grabbed the plate. Then I yelped and dropped it on the counter. Then I ate the hot dog. After a few minutes, I threw out the plate. I don't know if my mother ever knew where that counter burn came from.

       Some time later, after I was actually old enough to understand how heat works, I had an opportunity to show of my culinary skill to a friend. We were in middle school and dorky and hungry -- saying we were in middle school pretty much says the rest anyway. In an effort to quell the endless storm of stomach rumblings, we raided my companion's kitchen and unearthed a can of tomato soup. I proudly bragged that I could make a better recipe than the can recommended and then made...

       TOMATO SOUP WITH MILK! Had I ever actually read the label, I'd have known that milk instead of water was recommended as an alternate preparation. But I was proud nonetheless since I had learned this from my mother, NOT from the can.

       That which can really be called my "reason for cooking" would have to come into this story in fall of 1994 and is known as "cafeteria food." This stuff should be used for highway construction. Songs are written about how awful this stuff is. I had the opportunity, during my freshman year, to affect the menu at this benighted place. I was able to remove from the selections one particularly repulsive item called "empress shrimp," a recipe that would have been good enough had it been done right, (I could taste what they were trying to do,) but it came off as crap.

       The next summer, just at the end of the school year, I signed the lease on my first apartment. Joy! A kitchen of my own! With my already established propinquity for cooking and the spectre of SAGA food at my back, I picked up the pan and haven't yet put it down.

       Well, actually, I don't like to cook as much as Joel does. Then again, few people do. I know a few good dishes, mostly casseroule type things designed to feed a family of five (specifically the one in which I was raised). I'm not terribly creative about it, but the recipies I make I am pretty good at. I do enjoy the satisfaction of having people appreciate what I've cooked and tell me so, and since I come from a family of work-aholics, there is always appreciation involved when someone else does the cooking.

       One good thing about cooking, though is it makes me less hungry. Good way to lose weight!

       What I do enjoy is baking, which is a bad way to lose weight! I love to bake. Any activity that involves punching at something for 15 minutes and then eating chocolate is one I will do in a heartbeat. I started out with Brownies. Just the regular old, pre-mix from a box brownies, but every time I made them my family loved them and talked about how good "Kim's brownies" were and they soon became my "specialty". When Betty Crocker started coming out with fancy brownie mixes involving swirls of peanut butter and stuff, I realized that there was nothing fancy involved in that idea. It was mindnumbingly easy and didn't involve any special ingredients that were worth paying extra money for, so I tried it myself with regular brownie mix and plain old peanut butter that I had in the house anyway. Next thing I know, they're my "special peanut butter brownies" and people start asking me to bring them to class parties and church potlucks.

       A little flattery goes a long way, and I started being a bit more adventurous in my baking. I'm still pretty much a follow-the-recipe type of person, but now I don't hesitate to try something I thought sounded too hard before. I've discovered that I really like making breads and rolls and stuff from scratch. The kneeding and punching (as I mentioned before) is therapeutic, and there's just no match for home-baked bread.

       Perhaps I enjoy the breads and desserts more because I can spend my creative energies on the presentation without having to do anything earth-shattering to the food itself and people still love it. You can twist bread into dozens of different shapes, depending on your mood or the occasion, but the recipe remains simple and everyone loves them. Cookies always involve some sort of shaping or decorating and in the end you feel like you've done something really unique, even if you did just follow someone else's recipe.