Be careful if you run into a woman wearing an apron that says “Kiss the Cook,” because she may not kiss you back.
Women are strongly divided in the kitchen. Some are Julia Child re-incarnated and make Top Chef look like amateurs
This is a pasta extruder. In case you were curious.
at play. And there’s the rest of us who think heating up yesterday’s pizza means we cooked that night.
You can tell who’s who by stopping at Williams-Sonoma. If somebody’s paying $24.99 for a garlic press or $399 for a
pasta extruder (yes, that’s a real gadget) follow her home. She’s making something delicious.
If you see a woman in the frozen food section counting the carbs in a Lean Cuisine, walk on by. Chances are she uses her stove top as a desktop.
So preheat the oven and come feast on a three-course QuirkOut meal about the things women do in the kitchen.
THE GLASS PAN IS HALF EMPTY
Somebody invites you to a dinner party at her house, and you’re thrilled because there’s going to be a home-cooked meal without any cooking in your home.
Because you were raised to be polite, you ask, “Can I bring anything?” And horrors, the answer is “Yes.” Oh, it’s never something easy like, “Pick up a package of rolls.” No, it’s a time-consuming pain in the Cuisinart — like fruit salad or Beef Wellington.
Alison’s QuirkOut question solves this problem. She always asks, “Can I bring a dessert?” She simply buys a Sara Lee frozen pie, which she swears, “tastes better than homemade.”
After she “cooks” it, the yummy delight gets placed into her own glass pie pan so she can claim bragging rights.
She even brings the pies to church pot lucks and lies about baking them. (Technically this may be breaking one of the commandments.)
But she’s thrilled that no one’s the wiser and thinks what they don’t know won’t hurt them. Seems that Alison’s glass pan is always half full.
FOIE-PAS
Bridget is an excellent cook who hosts more dinner parties than the Kennedy White House did.
But she’s not perfect. Take the time she made paté from scratch. When she took it out of the mold, it hadn’t gelled, so 
the counter was covered in a gray liver soup.
Not one to be defeated, she scooped up the concoction and put it in a beautiful bowl. She presented “Foie Fondue” to her guests who dipped cubes of crusty French bread into the tasty mixture and declared it delicious.
The next day someone called begging her for the recipe. How do you give directions for a failed dish?
She quickly made up a QuirkOut tale. “This was created by a four-star Michelin chef in Paris, and I had to date him to get the recipe. It wouldn’t be right to pass it on.”
Voilà! Problem solved. Viva La France and Bridget’s great comeback.
CONTRADICTION COOKS
Jenny’s kitchen décor is wall-to-wall cookbooks. From Alton Brown to Wolfgang Puck, she’s got hundreds. We swear there was even one by Swedish Chef from Sesame Street. Or was it Cookie Monster?
With this vast personal library you’d expect her to be a master chef. Or at least in the running for a spot on Gordon Ramsay’s “Hell’s Kitchen.”
But, no. Jenny doesn’t even cook. Her QuirkOut treat is to read cookbooks, especially while she’s eating. “That way I can fantasize about other tasty meals,” she says licking her lips.
Her husband has adjusted to their takeout lifestyle and run-throughs at Barnes and Noble. As he explains, “I consider myself lucky. She could have a much more expensive addiction — like QVC.”
